The Summer Between
by ElouiseBates
Summary: Gwen Blake, seventeen and on the brink of womanhood, spends a summer in Glen St. Mary learning about life, love, and what it really means to grow up. COMPLETE
1. Chapter 1

"West House

"Glen St. Mary, PEI

"May 17, 1938

"Dear Gwen,

"How are you? Are you in the throes in final examinations? Goodness, I can't believe that you are seventeen, and that next September will mark the start of your final year of high school. Have you decided on a college yet, or even if you are going to go on for further schooling?

"You think your aunt is being awfully chatty, but really, I'm just trying to soften you up for the request I'm about to make.

"You heard, I've no doubt, that I had a little cold this spring. It wasn't anything serious, so I thought, but apparently there have been some complications as a result and the long and the short of it is that your uncles have confined me to my bed or, at the most, the sofa, for the duration of my pregnancy.

"I have reluctantly agreed, because although I think they are being paranoid, I don't want to do anything to endanger this lovely surprise baby! The only question now is, of course, how to manage for the next four months? Winnie is still a harum-scarum, and though Ruthie is a gem, she is only seven, and it is entirely out of the question for her to take care of the house, me, and your Uncle Bruce. Mother Meredith, Aunt Anne, Lynde, and even Mary Douglas have all offered to come help out, but they of course all have their own homes to attend, as well. Besides—

"Well, I'm embarrassed to admit it, but I don't really want any of them. All of them have their own way of doing things in a home, and I have my own way, and I can't help but think that it'll be far worse for my health for me to be upstairs in bed, fretting over having things done differently from how I want them. Bruce doesn't agree, of course, but what do men know of these things?

"So I have resorted to shamelessly begging my favourite niece to come take pity on me. I know (because I taught you!) that you can cook, and any child raised by your mother can at least keep a house tidy, and the girls adore you. I could tell you exactly how I wanted something done, and I could trust you to do it. Lynde, I know, would do it her way regardless of what I said, because she is convinced her way is best (and it likely is, but it's not _my_ way); Mary wouldn't even listen to me, and Mother Meredith and Aunt Anne would both try, but it would distress them terribly to try to change their ways now.

"Would you be willing to sacrifice your summer to help me out, Gwen? I know it's a terrible thing to ask a young girl, but it wouldn't be so bad; you'd still have plenty of time to go running down to the harbour as you loved to do two summers ago. Jack won't be around, but Lynde is, and Oliver and the rest of your Owls, I know, have missed you dreadfully.

"If you've already made plans for the summer, or you'd rather not come out, please don't hesitate to say so, and I will just make the best of what I have. If you do decide to come, though, the girls are already airing out the guest room for you.

"Write and let me know, and whichever way you decide, know that I'm always your loving,

"Aunt Ruth."

* * *

"Kingsport, Nova Scotia

"May 21, 1938

"Dearest Aunt Ruth,

"My bags are packed! Tell the girls not to fuss too much about my room; that will be my job when I get there. My train comes in on June 2. If Uncle Bruce is busy, I'll just make my own way to West House. I am so looking forward to 'bossing' you all about for an entire summer! Tell Uncle Bruce I expect him to toe the line.

"Give Winnie and Ruthie hugs for me, and a special pat to Baby. I will see you soon!

"Love always,

"Gwen."

* * *

"West House

"Glen St. Mary, PEI

"May 26, 1938

"Dear Gwen,

"You are an angel. I'll be at the station to meet you, even if half the inhabitants of the Glen come down with whooping cough! Your aunt is feeling better already, and the girls are beside themselves with excitement. I'll even make sure to wash my hands before every meal, you tyrant, just to show you my gratitude.

"Uncle Bruce."

* * *

"Kingsport, Nova Scotia

"May 30, 1938

"Dear Uncle Bruce,

"Hands _and_ face, if you please, sir. My train comes in at nine Thursday morning.

"Love,

"Gwen."

* * *

"I don't see why you have to go away again this summer," Jeremy grumbled as Gwen joined him in the manse's front yard. She laughed.

"You make it sound like I've been gone every summer for years."

"You were gone two summers ago, and I was busy with that ridiculous camp most of last summer, and now you're going away again."

Gwen still couldn't take his disgruntled tone seriously. "Well, if it bothers you that much, you'll just have to come visit us for a few weeks this summer."

He brightened at once. "I can do that, can't I? Last time you were on the Island, I had to rely on Father. This year, I'm old enough to travel out by myself if I want."

"Besides, Phil and the rest will still be here."

"Phil is swell, and you know I adore Lee and Jo, but there's just no one like my Gwen for me."

Gwen rolled her eyes, but inside she sparkled a little, as always, at Jeremy's declaration. It was nice to know she was as important to him as he was to her.

"Do you suppose they'll have changed much out there?"

"Does anything ever change in that little village?" Jeremy countered.

Gwen shook her head and leaned on the fence. "I wonder if they'll think I've changed."

"They ought to be impressed at how much better you can keep your balance now that you've finally gotten eyeglasses." Now it was Jeremy's turn to shake his head. "Honestly Gwen, all these years of straining your eyes, tripping over everything because you couldn't see, struggling in school because you had a hard time reading the board …"

"Yes, yes," Gwen said impatiently. "We've been through all this many times before. 'Vanity, thy name is woman' and all that. It was foolish—but at least I finally saw sense."

"And now you _see_ everything much clearer," Jeremy said, eyes twinkling over his own pun.

Gwen groaned. "I won't miss your terrible sense of humour this summer!"

He clutched his chest. "A hit! A veritable hit, fair maiden! Alas, so beautiful and yet so cruel."

Gwen laughed again. Only Jeremy could make her so light of heart. She was going to miss him this summer—but she was looking forward to seeing all of her Island family, and especially being able to help Aunt Ruth and Uncle Bruce. Last summer had been spent with Grandmother Blake at Mount Holly, the old family homestead to which she had retreated after Grandfather's passing. Gwen certainly didn't regret the time spent with her darling grandmother, who still seemed a girl herself despite her wrinkles and grey hair, but she did miss her Blythe family.

"What are your plans for the summer, since I won't be around to amuse you?" she asked Jeremy as they left the manse and walked down the street.

He shrugged. "I'll probably spend most of it at Mount Holly. You know Father doesn't like Grandmother being left alone for very long, and she refuses to keep any of the companions he hires to stay with her."

Gwen did indeed know.

"Companions!" Grandmother laughed, her voice still merry after all these years. "My dear Jeremiah, am I a fine lady of the 1800s?" And no matter how Uncle Jeremiah scolded and reasoned, she still sent all of the women away after just a week.

"She says they're all boring," Jeremy continued. "The women Father thinks are proper to stay with Grandmother she says are all scandalized by her irreverent sense of humour and her lack of proper decorum for a woman of her age."

"Poor Uncle Jeremiah," Gwen said without any real sympathy in her voice. She respected her father's brother, but he had never really seemed to belong much to the rest of the family—he took himself far too seriously, an affliction no one else suffered. Even Aunt Jenny, his sweet wife, seemed to belong more naturally to the Blakes than he did! Grandmother always called him "A true Byrne," in a tone that did not indicate approval.

Jeremy shrugged. "So I'll be staying there, to keep Father happy and to protect her from any more of his choices. If _you_ were going to be around, you could come too, and we'd have a grand time, you, me, and Grandmother, getting into all sorts of mischief. But no, you have to go be responsible."

"I am sorry," Gwen said with mock contrition. "It would be lovely to be irresponsible with you and Grandmother, but how could I refuse to go help Aunt Ruth?"

Jeremy's face, for once, was serious. "You can't, I know. Don't mind me, Gwen, I'm just being self-indulgent and whiny."

Gwen linked her arm through his. "Nonsense. I won't hear any bad things about you, not even from yourself."

Jeremy groaned. "You aren't good for me, Gwen. You let me think that I am perfectly wonderful, and you know I don't need any encouragement in that direction!"

"But you are wonderful," Gwen said, teasing and yet also half-serious.

Their mingled laughter, point and counterpoint, rang through the streets.

"There you are!" Phil called to them from the vacant lot where he and several other of their chums were waiting. "What took you so long?"

"Jeremy was whining," Gwen joked.

"Yes, that does tend to slow one down," said one of their friends, a tall thin girl who disdained her given name of Edwina (her mother had a sentimental streak) and always went by Poppy. Gwen had long suspected that Jeremy and Poppy were fond of each other as more than just friends, but she never dared hint her suspicions to either of them. They would probably have never spoken to each other again.

"Well, you're here now, so let's play," said Poppy's brother Bert (short for Hubert), tossing a ball into the air impatiently.

The group quickly separated into their usual two teams. Gwen was very poor at both catching and throwing, but her ability to round the bases faster than anyone else made her a valued member of the team. Jeremy, of course, was captain.

At sixteen, seventeen, and eighteen, most of the young people gathered there for baseball were torn between starting to feel too old for these sorts of games, and not being quite ready to enter the adult world of responsibilities quite yet. It was mostly boys gathered there to play; only Poppy, Gwen, and Wen Xue, the petite daughter of the owner of the local Chinese restaurant, who could hit and throw the ball more accurately than any of the boys, were still willing to get all dusty and sweaty playing with the boys. Most of the other girls in their classes gathered on the sidelines to watch and flirt.

The game, as most of them ended, resulted in a resounding win for Jeremy's side. Bert scowled at him afterward.

"At least with half of you being gone this summer, I'll actually have a chance to win once in a while," he said.

"Don't count on it," Jeremy said. "Gwen, Phil, and I may all be leaving, but Xue will still be here."

Xue smiled demurely, exhibiting none of the ferocity she showed on the field.

Bert shook his head. "Poppy, we need to practice more."

"You need to practice more," Poppy told him. "You and the rest of the sluggards on our team. I batted in two of our three runs today, remember."

"Yes, and missed half the catches you should have made."

Gwen left them bickering and caught up with Phil.

"Ready to go home?"

"Yes, please," Phil said. "Katie and Sally keep trying to get me to walk them home, and no matter how many times I tell them that I need to pack before leaving, they keep hinting. Maybe if you are with me, they'll leave me alone."

"Poor Phil!" Gwen felt bad for her brother. Reserved and thoughtful by nature, his good looks and grave courtesy made him an easy target for all the silly girls in their neighbourhood. The two sisters he had mentioned were some of the worst.

They approached the Blake siblings as they were leaving the lot.

"Oh Phil!" Katie called, batting her eyelashes so hard Gwen thought they might fall out. "Don't forget that you promised to walk Sally and me home! We have some of the latest dance records, don't you want to practice them with us?"

"Sorry, girls," Gwen cut in smoothly, before her brother could answer. "But you know Phil and I are both leaving in two days, and Mother and Dad want us home this afternoon so we can finish packing and all those other last-minute things. You'll have to wait to show Phil your dance skills until he comes back."

Phil's face lost some of its hunted appearance as she whisked him away. "Thank you," he breathed.

"Good thing you're going to be joining Uncle Carl on that scientific expedition this summer," Gwen said. "How else would you escape all those girls without me to help you?"

Thinking about an entire summer spent studying bugs and nature in Alberta brought an almost dreamy expression to Phil's face. Gwen laughed. "Only you would get more excited about bugs than girls!"

Phil punched her lightly in the arm. "How about you? When the other girls are planning their summer wardrobes and talking about parties and the new dance steps, you're playing baseball with your brother and cousin, and looking forward to spending your summer taking care of your bedridden aunt." He slanted a look sideways at her. "Unless, of course, the main attraction for the Island isn't Aunt Ruth, but a certain young gentleman Owl."

"Jack is going to be in India this summer with Aunt Faith and Uncle Jem," Gwen said with a straight face.

Phil shook his head. "Poor Oliver."

"I don't want to talk about Oliver; we're just friends, and we both know it. I haven't even spoken to him since we came home last time. Cards at Christmas, that's all." Gwen narrowed her eyes at Phil's skeptical expression. "And if you keep teasing me about it, I'll bring up all the letters you've gotten from the Glen girls since we came home. Lucy Douglas alone must have sent you two dozen!"

Phil raised his hands in surrender. "I yield! No more teasing." They walked on in comfortable silence. Just before they reached their own front gate, he added in a serious tone, "As happy as I am to be spending this summer with Uncle Carl, I am going to miss you, Gwen."

"I'll miss you, too."

"And keep an eye on Chloe!"

At the mention of their cousin, Chloe Ford, Gwen shivered. "Don't worry. Isaiah told me he'll make sure she doesn't try any of her old tricks."

Phil didn't have the trust in Chloe's brother Isaiah that Gwen did, but he nodded. "Just be careful."

"I will." Phil wasn't given much to demonstrations of affection, so Gwen refrained from hugging him. He saw the look in her eyes, though, and leaned over to give her a one-armed hug on his own. She hugged him back, thinking that no matter how much fun she had this summer, it just wasn't going to be quite the same without her dearest friend and brother.


	2. Chapter 2

"What, no welcoming committee, no brass band, no streamers and flowers?" Gwen asked as she stepped off the train into Uncle Bruce's welcoming hug.

"I wanted to bring them, but they wouldn't fit in the car," he said with a straight face.

Gwen laughed. Uncle Bruce might look alarming, with his thick brows and unsmiling features, but he was her favourite out of all the uncles. Uncle Shirley was wonderful, but quiet; Uncle Jem was jolly but too busy to spend much time with his nieces and nephews; Uncle Jerry had never fully recovered from his shell-shock during the Great War; and Uncle Carl paid very little attention to anyone at all, unless (like Phil) that person shared his interest in science. Uncle Jeremiah, on her father's side, was far more interested in business than family, and so Uncle Bruce, with his dry sense of humour and affinity for youthful companions, his habit of treating them as though they were all on the same level, not children and adults, easily rose to the top of the favourite list.

"How is Aunt Ruth?" was her next question.

"Bored," he replied. "Lynde is there with her now, and they have both been asking me every five minutes ever since breakfast if it was time to get you yet."

Gwen felt a pang of sympathy for her energetic, cheerful aunt, now confined to one room with no access to the outside world but for what news others brought to her.

"Did you want to drive?" Uncle Bruce offered as he hoisted her trunk into the car.

"Yes," Gwen answered at once, "But I had better not. Dad won't let me drive his car … he says it is too important to his work for me to wreck … so I don't have any driving experience at all."

"Well," Uncle Bruce said, in one of those casual gestures that made his nieces and nephews all adore him, "I'd be happy to teach you while you're here." Before Gwen could thank him, he added, "It will be good practice for my nerves for when Winnie's old enough to learn."

Gwen made a face at him. "Thank you very much." She slid into the passenger seat, resisting and took in the sights as they left the station.

Ah, but it was good to be back in the Glen! She had never once regretted her decision to go back to Kingsport with her family two years ago, but she had missed this place. The High School, with the track behind it where she had discovered her ability to run … the stores of downtown … there was a new building with round tables set out front, she would have to ask Aunt Ruth what that was … now they were out of the village proper, and she could see Ingleside, Rainbow Valley, the maple grove, all those dear places, filled with even dearer friends … through the woods, up the hill, and finally at the old West House!

Ruthie and Winnie had hung a crooked sign bearing the legend "Welcome Gwen" on the gate. They stood at the front door, waving frantically, their identical faces bearing matching grins. Behind them, framed in the open doorway, Lynde Wilson had a firm hand on each small shoulder, keeping the twins from dashing out and getting underneath the tires of Uncle Bruce's car. Gwen felt a grin creep across her own face. Dear, sensible Lynde!

"You're here!" Winnie screeched, finally wriggling free from Lynde's grip as Gwen exited the car. She ran full-tilt into Gwen's midriff.

"Oof!" Gwen gasped. Two small arms came up and wound themselves firmly around her waist.

"I thought you'd never get here," Winnie said in a plaintive voice.

"Let her be, Winnie," Lynde said patiently, coming along with Ruthie holding her hand. "Gwen, it's good to see you."

"Hello, friend," Gwen grinned, finally freeing herself from Winnie's grip. She gave Lynde a warm hug, then turned to Ruthie. "And hello to you too, little button."

Ruthie's face brightened. She was used to being overlooked in favour of her more exuberant twin. "Hello, Gwen. Mummy is going to be so happy you're here!"

That was Ruthie, Gwen thought, always thinking of somebody else.

"Not as happy as I am to be here," she said, breathing in deeply of the crisp sea air. Everything always seemed fresher at the West House, if for no other reason than that it stood atop a hill, where winds always blew. "Oh, girls! I've missed you all so!"

She swooped down and tried to hug all three at once, resulting in an ungraceful tumble to the path.

"Ahem," Uncle Bruce said.

Gwen tried to untangle her arms and legs. "Sorry, Uncle Bruce. Are we blocking the path?"

"Only slightly," he rumbled, pretending to stagger under the weight of her trunk.

"We'd best get inside ourselves," Lynde said, calmly rising to her feet and dusting off her skirt. "Or Mrs. Ruth will be out here against doctor's orders to say hello."

"Well, we can't have that." Gwen put one arm around Winnie, one around Ruthie, and followed her uncle and friend inside.

The old West house hadn't changed much at all in the two years since she'd come to the Glen last: the outside was still that beautiful silvery-grey covered in green vines, with fir trees behind it protecting it from the worst of the winds, and an old-fashioned garden in front. The West roses were famous throughout the Glen as always smelling the sweetest.

Inside, the house was as warm and cosy as ever. Two small children, a busy doctor, and a mother on bed rest had left it somewhat dustier and more disorganized than Gwen could remember it ever being, but there were still the loving little touches that made it homey—the family photographs on the mantel in the sitting room; the afghan Aunt Ruth had knitted on the back of the rocking chair; small sandals and lightweight coats in the hall; a battered teddy bear and old doll sitting side-by-side companionably on the bottom step, toys the girls had outgrown but couldn't bear to pack away.

And then there was Aunt Ruth, for now ensconced in the spare bedroom downstairs, where she could at least "feel more a part of things," Ruthie explained seriously to Gwen.

Her hair had a few more strands of grey, her face had a few more worry lines, but Gwen's youthful aunt was still as warm and cheery as ever, even trapped in a bed.

"Gwen darling!" she cried, sitting up and opening her arms for a hug. "You are an angel. Isn't she, girls, Bruce?"

Ruthie nodded, and Uncle Bruce grunted. "An angel with an infernally heavy trunk."

"Sorry," Gwen said apologetically. "Dad has set me a study load for the summer, something to help me fill out what I'm getting in school, give me a better chance of getting into a good college."

"Well," Uncle Bruce said. "I guess I can't complain too much about that, then."

Winnie wrinkled her nose. "Why do you want to spend your summer studying? I love summer because it means I'm _done_ with school!"

Gwen tweaked her nose. "I don't want to, silly, but I do it because it's going to help me."

"When I'm seventeen, I'll never do anything I don't want to."

"So all seven-year-olds say," Aunt Ruth laughed. "And nearly every one of them finds out differently, much to his or her dismay!"

"But how are you?" Gwen asked. She didn't really care to talk about her studies. Her parents had been so pleased, as had Phil and Jeremy, when she announced her determination to get good enough grades, even at Kingsport High, to be able to consider continuing her education. All of them had instantly assumed that meant she _would_ go on to college; Gwen didn't have the heart to tell any of them that she still wasn't sure. She only wanted to keep that option open in case she decided she did want to go on.

"Bored," Aunt Ruth said, making a face at her husband, that eminent doctor. "And I'm perfectly sure I am just fine to get up and be a productive member of society, if only your uncle weren't such a tyrant."

"You are being productive," he said, kissing her soundly. "You're growing a new life."

"You can't argue with that, Auntie," Gwen said, while behind her Lynde blushed at Dr. Bruce's free manner of talking, and slipped out to the kitchen.

Aunt Ruth sighed. "I suppose not. Well, we have all summer to catch up. Right now I'm sure you're exhausted, hungry, and filthy from the train. Go get yourself cleaned up, have some of the delicious food Lynde has prepared, get some rest, and then we can talk later."

Gwen kissed her forehead. "All right, Auntie. But I am making dinner tonight, and tomorrow I start right in doing whatever you ask of me. No need to treat me as a guest while I'm here!"

She had the satisfaction of seeing a look of peace cross her aunt's round face before she left the room, following Ruthie up the stairs and down the hall to what was going to be her room for the next few months.

Yes, this was where she was meant to be.

* * *

"West House

"Glen St. Mary, PEI

"June 4, 1936

"Dear Mother,

"I am mostly settled in here at West House. Oh Mums, did you ever spend much time up here when you were a girl? It's the best view in the Glen. I never really noticed it when I was here before; my head was probably too full of all the lessons Aunt Ruth was giving me! She says it gets fierce in the winter, when the winds are cold and strong, but right now it's beautifully cool even when everywhere else is stifling, and oh, the roses are magnificent.

"Winnie and Ruthie spend most of their days playing about the Glen. Thank goodness I don't have to take charge of them! I help them get dressed, get them their meals, and help them get ready for bed. Aunt Ruth says it's a mercy she was laid up in the summer, otherwise it would be dreadful trying to get them to school on time; even she has to hurry them along every morning so they won't be late!

"Aunt Ruth herself seems well enough, though Uncle Bruce keeps watching her very closely. I can tell he's nervous, because he's even gruffer than usual. She handed me several lists on my first day here, of how she likes things kept, where everything goes, and what sort of cooking Uncle Bruce and the girls like. She apologized about its detail, but it does make things easier! She is finicky, I must admit, but at least this is good practice for if I ever have a home of my own.

"Everyone else seems to be doing well enough. Aunt Faith, Uncle Jem, and Jack have already left for India. The village seems emptier without them, and Uncle Bruce has his hands full trying to keep up with all the sick people and babies. Grandfather's even been helping out some, though Grandmother worries that he'll tire himself out. Aunt Persis and Uncle Shirley are well—Owen has grown so tall, I hardly recognized him, and Leigh is turning into a beautiful young woman. Owen has recently discovered _girls_, and Aunt Persis says she finally understands why her mother's hair turned grey when Uncle Ken hit this age.

"Aunt Betty is here for the summer, along with the three young ones. She says she didn't want to stay in the city for the summer, and since she couldn't go to Alberta with Uncle Carl's entomological expedition, she came home to the Glen. Tommy, according to Lizzie, wanted to go with Uncle Carl (apparently he has quite the scientific bent himself, even at twelve), but Aunt Betty told him that he was too young, and they needed a man about the house this summer. Lizzie seemed to think this was contradictory (and I rather agree), but it at least reconciled Tommy.

"I haven't seen anything at all of Fanny yet, but I've only been here two days. Aunt Ruth tells me that she and Van Douglas seem quite serious, which I think is a good thing, and hope means that Fanny has decided to forgive me for letting Jack and Lynde fall in love. As if I could have stopped them even if I wanted to!

"I haven't had much chance to talk to Lynde yet—I know she thinks that Aunt Faith and Uncle Jem took Jack with them to India to keep the two of them apart, but I can't quite believe that, can you? I mean, he's going to be going off to college this autumn, so what harm would a few months do? They certainly aren't going to do anything stupid, like elope. Although that would be exciting!

"But poor Lynde is convinced Uncle Jem and Aunt Faith think she is ruining Jack's life, and half the time she agrees with them that she's not good enough for him. As if even a blind person couldn't tell that they are so perfectly suited for each other.

"Oh Mums, do you know what happens when you add too much baking powder to a cake? I do!

"I decided to bake a cake yesterday, as a way of celebrating my being here. _Just_ as I was measuring out the dry ingredients, Winnie and Ruthie came inside absolutely soaked to the skin. Winnie had wanted to play in the stream, and Ruthie agreed to hold her skirt so she wouldn't fall in, except then Ruthie slipped in the mud, and they both went in.

"They were a mess, dripping water and mud everywhere. I had to give them a bath, put them in dry clothes (I guess I am doing more childcare than I thought at first!), and then mop the floor where they'd dripped. By the time I was done, I couldn't for the life of me remember whether I'd added baking powder to the cake or not. I didn't think Aunt Ruth or Lynde had ever said anything about what happened if you put extra in, and I knew it would be no good without any, so I just measured out what the recipe called for and added it.

"Oh, it was dreadful. The cake collapsed in the centre, and was horribly bitter! No amount of frosting could save it! Poor Uncle Bruce saw it on the kitchen table before I had a chance to throw it out, cut himself a large slice, and … well, he said it was punishment on him for being greedy, and that Grandmother Meredith should have thought of something like that when he was a boy.

"I know you're wondering, so before I close I will simply say that I have not seen Oliver yet. And no, I'm not bothered by that, though I do hope we can be friends again. It's been long enough since we last saw each other, hasn't it?

"Give my love to everyone at home, and tell Dad that I am plugging away at my books. Aunt Ruth insists on me taking an hour to myself every day, and the entire day off on Fridays (when either Grandmother Blythe or Grandmother Meredith comes in to help), so even though I have become a busy housewife, I still have time to study.

"Love always,

"Gwen."


	3. Chapter 3

"Where are you off to today, Gwen? Down to the harbour for a run?"

"Dressed like this?" Gwen motioned to her pretty red and white striped sundress and laughed. "No, Auntie, I thought I'd wander down to the village and see if any of my old friends are around."

Aunt Ruth set the infant dress she was embroidering down and eyed her niece approvingly. "That dress brings out the colour in your cheeks, Gwen; I like it very much. Have a lovely time in the village, and if you get a chance stop by the new _café_. I would dearly like to know what it's like, and your uncle, man-like, can only tell me that they make fine coffee." She rolled her eyes up toward the ceiling.

"What café is that?" Gwen asked, interested at once. "Is that the new building I saw when Uncle Bruce brought me here from the train?"

Aunt Ruth nodded. "The owner is a man named Harville, and he's from England, and that's all anyone knows about him. He has two young people working there with him—too old to be his children—also from England, and nobody even knows their names."

"How fun," Gwen said. "There's a little café in Kingsport where I go sometimes with some of my friends. I'd love to visit this one."

"Just don't let Mary Douglas catch you," Aunt Ruth warned. "She thinks it is a den of iniquity."

"She's probably just worried it'll take business away from the pharmacy," Gwen said, and Aunt Ruth laughed.

"Have fun, dearest."

Gwen stopped on her way out to kiss Grandmother Blythe (established at the kitchen table, making cookies with Winnie and Ruthie), and clap a straw hat over her wayward curls, and then stepped out into freedom. She breathed deeply of the fresh, clean air. As much as she was enjoying the chance to be "boss" of a household, she was very, very thankful Aunt Ruth and Uncle Bruce were insisting on her taking Fridays off. She was, she feared, woefully inadequate as a proper young woman: she knew that she would get terribly bored if this was all she did for the rest of her life.

"Which does not bode well for my chances of getting married," she murmured aloud, and then laughed.

In her mind, her chances of getting married were slim at best, anyway. Although she had started growing into her arms and legs in the last year, and even though the eyeglasses helped, she was still awkward and clumsy at times (usually right when she wanted to make a good impression), and the face she saw in the mirror every morning didn't look, to her eyes at least, anything like the beauty her grandmothers insisted she was.

No man, she was certain, would want to marry a woman with eyes that took up half her face (especially now, with the glasses making them look even larger), a pointed chin, hair that refused to lay smoothly, and twice as many hands and feet as needed.

She was thankful that Mother, at least, never tried to convince her that she was prettier than she was, or even worse, tell her (as Aunt Nan did) that if she had a sweet, docile disposition it wouldn't matter what she looked like. Mother just smiled sympathetically whenever Gwen would lament her chances of getting married, told her that _she_ remembered being seventeen and feeling like the ugly duckling in a beautiful family, and then asked Gwen if she even wanted to get married at all.

Which final question always made Gwen pause. She wasn't sure that she _did_ want to get married … the more she delved into her writing, the fonder she became of the idea of being an independent authoress … but, if she was honest, she at least wanted to be asked. At least once, even if she said no at the end.

Mother laughed when Gwen confessed this.

Smiling a little now at the memory, Gwen sauntered down to the village.

The very first person she saw was her old chum and fellow Owl Mary Crawford. Mary was not very demonstrative, but her face lit in a warm smile when she recognized Gwen.

"Hullo, Gwen," she said, shaking the other girl's hand in a business-like manner. "I'd heard you were going to be here for the summer, helping Dr. Bruce and Mrs. Ruth out. How are you?"

"I'm well," Gwen said, trying not to look askance at Mary's mud-spattered boots, practical brown trousers, and old blue jersey. "How are you?"

"Marvellous," Mary said. "I'm working for your Aunt Persis now in the summers."

That explained the outfit, then. Aunt Persis' work usually led her through barnyards and cow fields.

"She's letting me do much of the small animals care, but today I helped her with vaccinations on Martin Clow's cows." Mary shook her head. "Give me cats and dogs any day over an ornery old heifer!"

"Give me pen and paper over any animals at all," Gwen confessed.

"It's good to see you, Gwen." Mary smiled again, and went on her way down the street to Persis Ford's veterinary clinic.

Venturing further into the heart of the village, Gwen saw many more familiar faces. Some stopped to say hello, some just waved and smiled, and one, sadly, pretended not to see her at all.

Fanny Elliot had been one of Gwen's first girl friends in the Glen—or anywhere, really. She had helped spark an interest in school, supported Gwen through her short-lived crush on Oliver Grant, and provided a sympathetic ear when life got too difficult.

The first cracks in their friendship came about when Chloe Ford arrived and started spreading lies about Gwen. Fanny, though she later claimed she never believed anything Chloe said, had turned her back on Gwen along with what felt like the rest of Glen St. Mary. Later, when Chloe had left and the rumours had died down, Fanny apologized for her cowardice and the girls' friendship had been restored, though not at the level it had been.

And then came the fatal dance, the one where Jack and Lynde first fell in love. Fanny had been in love with Jack for years, and somehow, she seemed to think that Gwen should have stopped Jack and Lynde's romance in favour of her.

Gwen still wasn't sure how she was supposed to have done that, or why, if Jack hadn't shown any interest in all their years as friends, Fanny thought that might change, but even if she had been able to, she wouldn't have. Lynde was her friend as much (or more, honestly) than Fanny, and Gwen wouldn't do anything to hurt her, not for anyone.

And so the friendship had withered and died, and though it hurt Gwen to see that Fanny was _still_ carrying a grudge, she had long ago told herself that if that was the way Fanny was, she would rather know now than twenty years into their friendship.

So she greeted Fanny's cut with a philosophical shrug, and pushed open the door to the _Café de la Mer_—

And promptly forgot all about Fanny, Jack, and Lynde.

She had entered, so it seemed, into an entirely new world.

Dark curtains hung over all the windows, keeping the café both dim and cool. Electric candles in sconces along the walls kept it from being too dark, and the dark wood of the tables and counter contrasted nicely with the light stain of the bare wood walls. Photographs of landscapes—Gwen was certain they were not taken in Canada—were scattered between the sconces.

The tables were round and only big enough for two or three; the machines behind the long, polished counter filled the air with the most delicious coffee scent; and the sight of the pastries in a glass case on the counter made Gwen's mouth water.

She immediately envisioned herself as a world-famous authoress, sitting in a café such as this in Paris or London, writing her stories and sipping _espresso_ with all the ease of sophisticated woman of the world.

"May I help you?"

The polished voice cut through her fantasies, and Gwen proved that she had a ways to go before she attained that elegance, by blushing and stammering as she made her reply to the very handsome young man behind the counter.

"Oh—er—I—just a coffee, please. And maybe a danish," catching sight of one within the case.

"One coffee and one danish," the young man responded with a smile that made Gwen's heart skip a beat. With smooth dark hair, dark eyes with a roguish twinkle to them, and a dimple making his grin endearingly lopsided, he reminded her a little of her cousin Jeremy.

Only without the safe family ties.

"I haven't seen you here before," he continued. "Are you just home now from university?"

Gwen was immensely flattered that he thought her old enough to be in college. "No," she said, unwilling to tell him she was still in high school. "I'm here from Kingsport to help my aunt and uncle, Dr. and Mrs. Meredith, for the summer."

The boy's face lit up. "Dr. Bruce's niece! He said you were going to be here soon."

"You know Uncle Bruce?"

The boy nodded vigorously, his hair tumbling down into his eyes. Gwen's hand itched with the sudden and irrational urge to push it back for him. "Oh, Dr. Bruce stops by almost every day for coffee and one of Uncle Edward's pastries. He's our favourite customer, isn't he, Ave?"

To Gwen's surprise, a girl popped up from behind the counter. She had the same dark hair and eyes and fair skin as the boy, as well as some shared features, but where they suited his face perfectly, they were all just a little too strong on her smaller face. The nose, the jaw, the cheekbones … everything was just a bit too masculine for prettiness.

Gwen took to her no-nonsense air at once, though.

"Oh, Dr. Bruce is a gem," she said. She grinned at Gwen. "Ava Wentworth, pleased to meet you. This," poking the boy in the ribs, "is my brother Hayden."

"Gwen Blake," that young lady responded. She sat down on the tall stool in front of the counter and took the white mug Hayden pushed across to her.

"Cream and sugar?" he asked.

Gwen shook her head, and he looked impressed. "Even Ave can't drink it straight."

Gwen grinned at the memory of an entire year gagging on black coffee, just to train herself to like it black. Now, of course, she couldn't imagine drinking it any other way. As she took a sip of the delectable brew, she tried to figure out a way to ask the pair about themselves without sounding gossipy.

"Edward Harville is our uncle," Hayden saved her the trouble by volunteering. He leaned his forearms on the counter and seemed perfectly willing to chat with her all day. Gwen felt her cheeks warm, and took another sip of coffee to hide her confusion.

"Our father's cousin, actually," Ava corrected him. "But we call him uncle."

Hayden rolled his eyes. "You're always so precise, Ava."

"One of us has to be," she shot back, tossing her long hair over her shoulder as she carried a pot of coffee to one of the occupied tables.

"Anyway," Hayden continued, "Uncle Edward broke family tradition by not joining the Navy as soon as he was done school. He informed the family that he had no interest in the sea or the land, and that he wanted to be a restaurateur. They were naturally horrified, but when they couldn't change his mind they shipped him off to Canada, where he, undaunted, opened this little café." He finished his tale with a flourish.

It all seemed very English to Gwen—family tradition, the rebellious son, leaving the homeland in disgrace to forge out a new life … her fingers itched to get at her pen and shape it into a story. It would have to have a romance angle to it, of course. Perhaps a childhood sweetheart who stood by the brave adventurer through it all, and followed him to the new world?

And he would have to be something besides a restaurateur, of course. That was interesting enough in real life, but wouldn't carry enough flair for fiction. A rancher, perhaps, going out west to the untamed lands.

She belatedly realized that Hayden was waiting for her response while her mind wandered, a bemused expression on his face.

"Sorry," she said, blushing again. "Um … so how do you and your sister fit into this?"

"Ah!" he said, brightening. "I'm glad you asked. The pater's always had a soft spot for Uncle Edward, and so he sent Ave and me out for the summer to make sure he does all right. He'll be rather pleased, I think, to hear that Uncle's making a right go of it on his own."

"He'll be shocked," Ava said, slipping back behind the counter and rejoining the conversation easily. "But Mother'll be pleased. She's really the one with the soft spot for Uncle. Father just can't say no to her."

"Neither can anyone else," Hayden said.

"I can," Ava said. It wasn't a boast, merely a simple statement of fact.

Hayden looked amused. "Yes, but that's because nobody can say no to you, either. Except Mother. The two of you are just alike."

"Nonsense," Ava said, though the slight smile that curved her lips belied her brusque tone. "Mother has ten times the amount of charm that I do. _You_ inherited the charm, Hay. I got Father's …"

"Run straight on ahead, knocking every obstacle in your way down until it all conforms to your wishes, manner?" Hayden offered.

"I was going to say lack of tact, but that works," Ava smirked.

Gwen couldn't keep back a laugh at their banter, but at the same time she felt a pang. How she wished Jeremy or Phil could be there with her! Phil wasn't much for banter, but the camaraderie these two shared was so similar to Gwen and her brother.

As for Jeremy, well, his golden tongue could match even Hayden's.

As if reading her thoughts, the young man turned his head and winked at her. "You're going to make Gwen think we're awful, Ave."

Ava sniffed. "If she has any sense, she'll already think you're awful."

He pulled a long face. "Oh come now, sister, tarnishing my reputation already? I never thought you could be so cruel."

"You haven't got any reputation to tarnish," Ava said. "I distinctly heard that one woman—the one who always scowls at Uncle Edward, the one with those eerie eyes?—I heard her muttering something about you being a danger to all girls, and ought not to be allowed."

Hayden burst out laughing, and at the merry peal, Gwen couldn't help but join in.

"That would be Mrs. Douglas," she said. "She doesn't like change, unless she's the one implementing the changes. _And_ she has a fifteen-year-old daughter, so she's distrustful of all the boys, not just you."

"Is she pretty?" Hayden asked.

"Mrs. Douglas?" Gwen asked blankly.

Hayden chuckled. "No, the daughter."

"Oh." Gwen felt a small stab of disappointment, but buried it swiftly. "Lucy is very pretty," she said truthfully, but couldn't help adding, "And her mother is very terrifying."

"Good," Ava said. "There's one girl safe from Hay's fatal charm. I don't know how he does it, Gwen, most of the time he doesn't even try, but everywhere he goes girls fall at his feet."

"I have a cousin like that," Gwen said, sternly counselling herself not to blush again. She _hadn't_ fallen at Hayden Wentworth's feet, nor was she planning to.

"You could have boys falling at your feet, if you wanted, Ave," Hayden said loyally. "The only problem there is that you scare all of them away."

Ava smiled. "If they're weak enough to be scared away by a strong-minded woman, they aren't my type anyway."

Hayden turned appreciatively to Gwen again. "And you, I am sure, have to beat the boys off with a stick."

"Not exactly," Gwen said ruefully, wishing—just once!—that it was true. How nice it would be to think that Hayden was flirting with her because he found her attractive, not because it was his nature to flirt with everyone.

The door to the café opened again, and all three turned to see who the new customer was. Gwen's heart sank. It was probably the last person she would have liked to have walk in and find her laughing and talking with a handsome man.

Oliver Grant's face twisted with surprise and displeasure. "Gwen?"

Gwen tried a smile. "Hello, Oliver." Her voice sounded sickly even to her own ears.

Behind her, Hayden's low, amused chuckle rolled out again. "See? What did I tell you?" he whispered, before vanishing in the back to leave Gwen to face her one-time, would-be suitor.


	4. Chapter 4

"I heard you were back," Oliver said, his voice very carefully neutral.

"Yes, I'm here," Gwen said, not even sure why exactly she was stressing _here_ over _back_. Perhaps Oliver talking about her being "back" reminded her too much of his possessive attitude last winter, his assumption that this was where she belonged.

"How are you?" she continued brightly. "Enjoying your summer?"

Oliver shrugged. "It feels a little strange with Jack being gone."

"May I help you?" Ava interrupted them.

Oliver looked startled. "Oh—er, no, no thank you."

Ava's dark eyebrows flew to the top of her forehead. "You came in without wanting anything?"

Even in the dim light, Gwen could see Oliver's colour darken. "I, uh, I came in to see Gwen. Mary Crawford said you were in the village today, and then when you weren't in the pharmacy or Flagg and Douglas', I remembered how much you liked coffee and thought you might be in here …" his voice trailed off.

"You should be a detective," Ava said dryly. "A regular Sherlock Holmes."

Oliver seated himself on the stool next to Gwen.

"Sorry," Ava said. "Seating is for customers only."

He looked annoyed. "Fine. I'll take a coffee."

"You don't drink coffee," Gwen pointed out.

"We have tea, if you prefer," Ava said. Gwen wondered if she was just imagining the spark of mischief in the other girl's eyes.

"Tea, then," he said impatiently.

"India or China?"

"Whichever is easiest," he growled.

Ava shook her head. "They are equally easy—or equally difficult, depending on your point of view."

"India, then," Oliver said, obviously just picking one out of the air.

Ava smiled. "Coming right up." Her voice was smooth and sweet, and Gwen decided she definitely had not imagined the mischief. Even after a few moments' conversation, Ava did not strike her as sweet.

She couldn't help but be grateful for the distraction to Oliver, though.

"So," he said, dismissing Ava from his mind and turning back to Gwen. "How has school been?" There was a distinct bite of challenge to his words, and Gwen felt a small stab of annoyance. Just because Kingsport High was bigger school than the Glen High, with teachers who couldn't pay as much individual attention to the students, didn't mean her education was suffering for being there.

"School has been excellent," she said. She motioned to her spectacles. "I found that everything started going much better once I got these."

"I thought something looked different," he said.

"One Indian tea," Ava said, placing a steaming cup before Oliver.

"Thank you," he said. He took one sip, grimaced, and set the cup back down. "Are you finished?" he asked Gwen.

"Why?"

"I thought maybe we could take a walk, get caught up." He smiled uncertainly, and Gwen's annoyance melted away. Oliver really had been a good friend, until he let romance interfere. "Go down to the harbour, our old spot?"

The annoyance returned. The harbour run had been _Gwen's_, and even though Oliver had shared it with her in the past, it was her special place, not "theirs."

"Sorry," she said. "I'm afraid I'm not free."

"Why not?" He looked hurt, and guilt mixed in with all of Gwen's other feelings. It wasn't—entirely—Oliver's fault that he kept rubbing her the wrong way. She bit her lip, wondering what excuse she could use.

"Gwen has offered to show my brother and me around the Glen," Ava said unexpectedly. "We haven't been here that long, you know, and we haven't really gotten to know anyone or know anything about the village." She smiled at Gwen. "We'll be ready for our break in about ten minutes, if that's all right by you?"

"That will be fine," Gwen said, feeling both relieved and conspiratorial. She wondered what had prompted the other girl to come to her rescue, but decided not to push the matter.

"Fine," Oliver said shortly, the black brows he had inherited from his mother drawn together in a fierce scowl. "I guess I'll just see you around, then."

Gwen told him that that sounded good, and he left after paying for the tea he didn't drink.

"Hope you didn't mind me jumping in like that," Ava said. "It just didn't seem like you were all that glad to see him, and I thought maybe you could use some help."

"No, I'm very grateful," Gwen said. She could see why Hayden said Ava was the forceful one—and why it was hard to say no to her. That decisive manner, with her undeniable—if unusual—charm, was a powerful combination.

"You don't really have to show us around, if you've other things you'd rather do," Ava said.

"Is it true, that you haven't had a chance to get to know the Glen at all?"

"Well, yes." Ava rubbed the counter with a cloth and lowered her voice. "The fact is, Hay and I seem to be rather unpopular around here. You're the first young person to say more than hello to us since we got here." Surprisingly, her dark eyes showed a hint of hurt. "I daresay I wouldn't blame them for disliking us _after_ they've gotten to know us, but to not even give us a chance … well, I suppose that was another reason I gave that boy a hard time."

"How horrible!" Gwen was immediately indignant. Why should the Glen young folk have a prejudice against the Wentworths? She wished Jack were still there; he was friendly to everyone, and all the other Glen youth followed his lead in everything.

Well she wasn't her cousin, but she'd show them that _she_ wasn't afraid to be friends with the two newcomers.

"As it happens, I have this entire day free," she said with her friendliest smile, "And I would love to show you all around the Glen."

"Really?" Ava beamed. "We really are free in—well, about five minutes by now. Uncle Edward always gives us our breaks together. Let me go just let Hay know."

"Hay knows," came that young man's drawl from the back room. "I've been back here listening to every word the two of you and Gwen's young man friend have said."

Ava rolled her eyes, and Gwen laughed.

"I'll tell Uncle Edward we're going," Hayden's disembodied voice continued.

"Uncle Edward's shy, which is one reason we're here to help him get started—we do most of the waiting on customers, while he takes care of everything behind the scenes. I'm supposed to help him hire new help before we go home this autumn," Ava explained to Gwen.

Hayden popped back into view. "He said we can go."

Ava untied her apron and came out from behind the counter. Gwen caught one glimpse of a short, thin man drifting in from the back before she saw, for the first time, Ava's outfit.

She was wearing trousers, and not the practical fishing trousers like Mary Crawford had been wearing, but long, wide-legged linen trousers like what Katharine Hepburn always wore in her films.

It was one thing for children to wear trousers or overalls for working around the farm or playing with their chums, but Gwen knew very few girls her age or older who wore them in public, or anywhere but the shore and for bed. Even her own mother never wore trousers outside the house, though that perhaps had more to do with her role as minister's wife than any desire to be proper for her own part. Aunt Persis and Mary, again, wore them when they were doing vet work out on the farms, but even then people tended to sniff at the impropriety of it. Gwen doubted even fearless Aunt Persis would wear trousers out and about in society.

It explained, perhaps, why the more prim maidens of Glen St. Mary looked askance at Ava, just as Hayden's insouciant slouch and knowing grin might be off-putting to the lads. Gwen, however, found both refreshing. She only wished she could be daring enough to emulate Ava! The trousers looked both comfortable and stylish, and Ava's air of unconsciousness regarding them only added to their appeal. Gwen knew that if she ever tried wearing trousers in public, she would be so aware of them that she would be twice as clumsy, and three times as awkward, as usual.

Hayden held out his arms. "Shall we, ladies?"

Ava hooked her arm through one of his, and after a moment's hesitation, Gwen did the same on his other side, and the trio sauntered out into the bright sunshine.

* * *

"West House

"Glen St. Mary, PEI

"June 12, 1936

"Dear Lee,

"I've been here less than two weeks, and already I've made two new friends! Their names are Hayden and Ava Wentworth, and they are from England. They are spending the summer in the Glen helping their uncle start a café. Ava is my age, while Hayden, I think, is a year or two older.

"They are both very nice—well, perhaps _nice_ isn't the best word to describe them. They are interesting and intelligent and very strong, but nice just doesn't seem to fit them well. Not that they aren't nice! It's just … too weak.

"Apparently, most of the Glen young folk have been snubbing them ever since they arrived. The only reason I can see for that is that Ava wears trousers, and they both have an air of not really caring about what other people think of them—do you remember that Agatha Christie book of mine, _The Secret of Chimneys_? The one you liked because you thought Bundle Brent was a little bit like Nancy Drew? Anyway, at one point in that, when Superintendent Battle is talking about Virginia Revel—hang on, I'll look it up.

"I'm back. Here it is: _'You see, the majority of people are always wondering what the neighbours will think. But tramps and aristocrats don't—they just do the first thing that comes into their heads, and they don't bother to think what anyone thinks of them. I'm not meaning the idle rich, the people who give big parties, and so on, I mean those that have had it born and bred into them for generations that nobody else's opinion counts but their own. I've always found the upper classes the same—fearless, truthful, and sometimes extraordinarily foolish.'_ That's how Ava and Hayden are; it just doesn't occur to them that other people might think to condemn them.

"And that, of course, rankles everybody else, who don't like feeling as though they don't matter! Both Hayden and Ava have noticed the coldness of everyone around here, and it does hurt them somewhat—they are ready and willing to be friends with anyone, and can't understand why everyone here is so standoffish.

"So, I decided that for once _I_ wasn't going to care about public opinion either, and I spent all day yesterday showing them around. They are very good company—I haven't laughed so much in ages—and they are clever, too, making me wish I had better brains and could keep up with them. Phil could, or Jeremy, but I'm let afraid that if I open my mouth I'll just let my ignorance show!

"If I'm _perfectly_ honest (which I couldn't be with anyone but you, dearest), I had a mean, sneaking, selfish reason for spending yesterday with them, too. You see, Oliver came into the café while I was just getting to know Ava and Hayden, and oh, he did irritate me so. Everything he said just rubbed me the wrong way, even the harmless parts. I don't know why I was so upset, except that perhaps I'm too sensitive around him, after everything that happened last time we were here.

"Anyway, he _obviously_ didn't like me talking to Ava, and especially not Hayden, and so in a fit of pure spite I decided to show him I didn't care whether he approved or not, that I was going to show him I could be friends with whomever I wished! He doesn't have the right to dislike my acquaintances.

"I think I maybe have been a little _too_ friendly to Hayden after that—I didn't mean to flirt, but really, he is so charming, and I think I might have gotten carried away. I know he could never be truly interested in me, though. Not only is he remarkably handsome (and charming, as I already mentioned), but they are, after all, English aristocracy. Which means that he will be expected to marry well, not a poor minister's daughter from Canada with barely an illustrious ancestor to her name.

"So I'm not letting myself feel too guilty about flirting with Hayden. Besides, you remember all those stories Grandmother (Blake, not Blythe) has always told us, about her younger days? I always wondered what it would be like to be such a _belle_, to have the power to make boys crazy about you just by looking at them. Chloe, I'm sure, will be able to do that wen she is older, or maybe can already. But me, I'm just boring old, clumsy, plain Gwen, and boys don't think of me as anything but a pal. Except for Oliver, and as soon as he decided he liked me it was as if he wanted to own me—definitely not fun.

"I'll never be a belle like Grandmother, but it was enjoyable hearing nonsense from Hayden about my beautiful eyes and golden hair, and pretending to myself that I actually had made a dent in his heart, instead of, as I suspect is the case, being the recipient of flattery he pours out without thinking on every girl he meets. Ava says he can't help flirting with women, whether they be eighteen or eighty, and she feels sorry for his wife when he does get married.

"I've written enough foolishness for now, and I think my bread is ready for the second rising, so I'll end this here. I'm glad you are having a good summer so far. Give my love to Mother and Dad, and Jo, and everyone else. And as always, extra love to you, dearest sister.

"Always yours,

"Gwen."

Gwen capped her fountain pen and folded her letter with a little smile playing about her lips. She really did feel a bit guilty about her flirtatious behaviour with Hayden … but she couldn't help also feeling exhilarated by it. She hoped Lee would understand. Her sister tended to be depressingly good at times, but Gwen didn't know anyone else to whom she could write, and she couldn't keep this new friendship to herself. Lynde would have been her first choice to talk to, but with Lynde practically in mourning for Jack, Gwen felt it might be a little indelicate to chat about a flirtation with the new boy.

Writing to Phil would have been completely futile—she was too embarrassed to think about writing to Mother—and if she'd written to Jeremy he would have been down by the next ferry and train to threaten Hayden with dismemberment and death.

Out of all her friends and family, Lee was the safest.

Gwen slid the letter into an envelope, addressed and stamped it, and took it downstairs with her for Uncle Bruce to post in the morning.

Time to put _belle_ Gwen away, and put on housewife Gwen. In Aunt Ruth's spacious kitchen, she tied her apron around her waist and went to work shaping the bread dough into loaves and putting it in the prepared pans to rise. She may have failed with her attempt at cake, but thus far her bread-making abilities were proving secure!


	5. Chapter 5

Gwen had just finished her usual Monday cleaning (Aunt Ruth had a very strict schedule for what cleaning happened on what days—another reason she hadn't wanted another housewife in to help. "They'll want to dust on _Tuesdays_," she fretted) when Grandmother Blythe knocked on the open back door.

"Anyone home?" she called.

Gwen ran in from the parlour. "Come in, Grandmother!" she said gaily. "You have perfect timing, as always." She kissed her grandmother's cheek. "How are you?"

"Wonderful, and even better for seeing your bright eyes," Grandmother said.

"Are you here to see Aunt Ruth?"

"I'd like to say hello, naturally, but mostly I was hoping for a chat with my granddaughter. Can she spare the time?"

"For you, always," Gwen said. "I'll put the kettle on for tea while you go say hello to Aunt Ruth."

"Perfect," Grandmother said. "I brought some of Lynde's biscuits and the last of last year's raspberry jelly."

Gwen grinned in appreciation.

Aunt Ruth duly greeted and the tea properly brewed, Gwen and Grandmother took their snack to the front porch, where they could see everything and smell the roses.

"I love my garden better than almost anywhere else on earth," Grandmother said. "But I must admit I've always envied the Wests—and now Bruce and Ruth—their roses. Even Susan Baker and I couldn't get ours to compare. And this view! Gwen, how do you manage to get any work done with this view here luring you out?"

"I do take frequent breaks just to run out here and soak it in," Gwen admitted with a laugh. "And I've been doing my schoolwork out here most fine days. I'm not sure it's helping me concentrate on what I'm supposed to be learning, but it's better than sitting inside and thinking about being out here."

"A house isn't a home without a porch," Grandmother declared.

Gwen thought ruefully of the Kingsport manse, which had neither porch nor garden. Mother and Dad both loved gardens, but the manse soil was too poor to sustain any plants. She knew Mother sometimes wished they could own their own house, but Dad's salary just wasn't enough, even aside from the fact that the people in the church would have been horrified by the thought of their Reverend Blake living somewhere besides the manse. That was where the reverends and their families _always_ lived.

"So, Gwen," Grandmother said. "How are you, really?"

Something about Grandmother just invited confidences. Maybe it was the fact that, despite her white hair and wrinkled skin, she still seemed just like a girl herself. Maybe it was the fact that she _never_ gossiped about other people, so one never had to worry about her telling one's secret. Maybe it was that those still-starry grey eyes promised understanding and interest.

Whatever it was, Gwen found herself telling Grandmother all about Hayden, Ava, Oliver, Fanny, Lynde, and all the tangled threads of their relationships. Dear, wise Grandmother never once interrupted, just sat and sipped her tea and looked out over the clear blue horizon, perhaps thinking back to her girlhood days and the complicated relationships that arose then.

"Well, my dear," she said, when Gwen finally ran out of words. "I must say I think you've behaved very well in all this."

"Really?" Gwen said, sitting up a little straighter.

"You've been a true friend to Lynde—and to Fanny, though she might not want to recognize it. As one who has fancied herself a matchmaker in the past, I can assure you that it does no good to push two people together when at least one of them isn't interested in the slightest. Meddling in relationships only causes heartbreak. Most of the time," Grandmother added, eyes twinkling a little. "Remind me to tell you sometime about Nora and Jim Wilcox, for an example of a time when meddling _did_ work—even if Nora did almost box my ears for it!"

"Grandmother, do you think Lynde isn't good enough for Jack?" Gwen didn't know why she asked it, but she had to know.

"Goodness, child, I have seen false pride ruin far too many people's lives to indulge in any of it. Lynde is one of the finest young women I know, the descendent of a good and worthy family, and Jack is a dear lad. And you know, Gwen," placing a hand on her granddaughter's knee, "It isn't that Jem and Faith disapprove of Lynde because of family pride. If I thought my son believed that sort of foolishness, I would _spank_ it out of him, that I would!"

Gwen laughed at the image of her tiny grandmother turning big, strong Uncle Jem over her knee and spanking him. "But then what don't they like about Lynde?"

Grandmother sighed a little. "They say that she's not ambitious enough, that they're afraid she'll hold Jack back from pursuing his dreams."

"But if Jack fell in love with someone who was ambitious, don't you think they'd fret that she would be too interested in her own career to help his along?" Gwen asked.

"Yes, in fact I do. The truth of the matter is that Jem and Faith wouldn't like any girl Jack cared for. He's their only child, you know, and …" Grandmother's voice trailed off, and her face took on that distant, pained expression that all her grandchildren, even Chloe, knew meant she was thinking of Uncle Walter. "He has a heavy legacy to live up to," was all she said.

Gwen bit her lip and tried to understand. Everyone said Uncle Walter had been brilliant, and that he would have had a magnificent future as a poet if he hadn't been killed. Jack was named for him and Grandfather Meredith (John Walter Blythe— "A fine name," Grandfather Blythe often said proudly), who was also renowned as a brilliant scholar. If everyone, especially his parents, expected Jack to live up to his namesakes … well, Gwen supposed she could see why Uncle Jem and Aunt Faith wouldn't think anyone was good enough for him, particularly Lynde, who was indifferent to school and had very few goals besides making those around her comfortable and happy.

Which, to Gwen's mind, was far more noble and worthy than most goals, but certainly _seemed_ insignificant next to writing the most moving poem of the War, or having your name known throughout Canada for your views on God's purpose in allowing evil.

"But if Jack thinks Lynde is right for him," she said aloud, puzzling it through, "Shouldn't that be good enough?"

"It should be," Grandmother agreed. "But it rarely is. Don't fret, dearest; Jem and Faith are sensible, loving people, and if Jack and Lynde really care for each other, they'll come round in time. Above everything else, they want Jack to be happy."

The small amount of resentment Gwen hadn't even realized she'd been harbouring against her aunt and uncle eased at Grandmother's words.

"As for Ava and Hayden," Grandmother continued, her eyes flashing splendidly, "I'm ashamed of the people of this village, I am indeed! Have we really grown so small and petty-minded to turn against two charming young people just because they are different and unconventional?"

Gwen had a sudden flashback to her previous summer here, where nearly every single person in the Glen had turned against her due to Chloe's sordid rumours. Nobody had ever told Grandmother about that time, though, at Gwen's specific request, so she bit her lip and listened silently.

"Tell you what I'm going to do, Gwen," Grandmother said. "I'm going to hold a little dinner party this Saturday. I'll say it's for you—now, don't argue until you've heard me out—and I'll invite all your friends: Mary Crawford, Oliver, even Fanny, some of the other Owls. I'll also invite Ava and Hayden, and when the Glen people see for themselves how charming and nice they are, maybe things will get easier."

It was a good plan—the sort of thing that only Grandmother would think of—but Gwen still groaned. "Does it have to be for me, Grandmother? I hate being the centre of attention!"

"It's for a good cause, dearest," Grandmother said solemnly.

Gwen sighed and submitted. "What about Aunt Ruth, though? I can't leave her except on Fridays."

"I'm sure someone will be happy to fill in for you for a few hours—Rosemary Meredith for one, or even your Uncle Shirley."

There didn't seem to be any more excuses, so Gwen could do nothing but graciously nod, and secretly wonder _what_ in her wardrobe was good enough for a dinner party like this.

Oh, if only she had the courage to wear trousers like Ava's!

* * *

"Are you going to wear a _ball gown_?" Ruthie asked breathlessly, her velvety brown eyes wide with anticipation.

"Red velvet with ropes of pearls and diamonds?" Winnie added.

"Or that dress you're wearing in that picture on Ingleside's mantel, of you and Lynde and Jack and Oliver?"

"Ooh yes, that one!"

Gwen burst out laughing. "It's just a summer dinner, you two! I'm not wearing a ball gown, or the dress of Mother's from the Midwinter Dance."

"Well, the dinner is in honour of you, so you do need to wear something extra-nice," Aunt Ruth said. Her cheeks were pink with excitement, and her eyes were sparkling almost as much as her daughters'. She did enjoy dressing up, and with being confined to her bed, helping Gwen dress was her only outlet.

"Besides," she confessed to Gwen, "It's almost _more_ fun helping you—you are young and beautiful and have a perfect figure, and I am short and round and the mother of almost-three!"

Privately, Gwen thought her aunt was still beautiful, but she was grateful for the assistance. She loved pretty clothes, but had no eye for picking them out for herself. Mother was no help, either, as Aunt Nan or Grandmother had always picked her clothes out for her.

"The worst thing about marrying your father was that suddenly I had to choose my wardrobe for myself," she'd once sighed ruefully to her daughter. "Thankfully our finances have always been so limited that I never had much to choose from!"

Aunt Jenny helped Gwen with most of her clothes, and Aunt Nan sometimes sent pretty things from Avonlea. Aunt Rilla sometimes sent things, too, but they were usually frilly and fussy, the sort of things that looked marvellous on Chloe but made Gwen look and feel ridiculous. Aunt Nan and Aunt Jenny—and Aunt Ruth—had a much better instinctive feel for what worked with Gwen.

"So," Aunt Ruth said now, turning over the garments Gwen had laid out on the bed, "These are our options?"

"I know it's not much," Gwen said apologetically. Not for worlds would she admit this to anyone, but she had had to forgo any new clothes this year so they could afford to send Phil on Uncle Carl's expedition. Not even Phil himself knew how much they had sacrificed for this trip, or he would have refused to go.

"Nonsense," Aunt Ruth said. "There's plenty to choose from." She hummed under her breath for a few moments while she looked, then triumphantly plucked one from the pile. "Here it is!"

It was one of Aunt Jenny's dresses, Gwen's Sunday dress all last summer. Smoke-blue rayon made up the under-slip, with a blue sheer buttoning over it, forming the sleeves and covering the the bodice, floating out separate over the skirt. Gwen loved it, but she was afraid it was too simple.

"It isn't going to look plain beside everyone else?" she asked.

Aunt Ruth shook her head. "Not at all. I've told you before, Gwen: a well-made and simple dress that fits you well and suits you, is far more attractive than something that is fancy and cheap and ill-suited. From what you tell me about Ava Wentworth, I'm sure she will be wearing something simply and beautifully made, and Mary and the other Owls aren't drowning in finery, either."

Gwen acknowledged the truth of her aunt's words with a nod, and reached for the dress.

"Blue is such a good colour for you, Gwen, it brings out your eyes."

"I like dramatic colours," Gwen admitted. "Red, and black, and bright purple, and the like."

"Well," Aunt Ruth laughed, "I hate to disappoint you, but I think more subtle colours suit you best. Not pastels, but say … _dark_ red, brown or grey instead of black, blue, not purple, gold instead of yellow, cream rather than white … that sort of thing. And clean lines, simple accessories, small, stand-up collars instead of the big peter pan collars, no bows anywhere …" Her eyes were glowing and she was waving her arms violently.

"I bow to your wisdom, Auntie," Gwen said, stifling a giggle.

"But red lipstick, Mummy?" Winnie pleaded.

"Dad would never let me!" Gwen said. "He doesn't like me to wear makeup at all."

"Red is too splashy," Aunt Ruth declared. "And a seventeen-year-old girl doesn't need makeup—maybe just a hint of powder on her nose, and a soft _pink_ lipstick for her mouth. You have lovely skin, Gwen. That complexion must come from your Blake side; the Blythes are all pale."

Personally, Gwen would rather have had Mother's white skin and grey-green eyes over her round cheeks that flushed far too easily, and blue eyes that seemed common and over-bright under her pointed, startlingly black brows. Someone at school had once asked Gwen if she _dyed_ her hair; the soft gold looked so odd compared to her black eyebrows.

"There," Aunt Ruth said. "Here I am chattering on. Go and get dressed, Gwen! Mother Meredith will be here any time, and we don't want you to be late to you own party!"

"It's really for Hayden and Ava," Gwen reminded her. "Grandmother's just using me as an excuse."

Aunt Ruth's eyes twinkled, but she nodded solemnly enough. "Still, it wouldn't do to be late. Hurry!"

Gwen obeyed, running back up the stairs to her room, where she reluctantly put on her one pair of good sheer stockings (how she hated covering her legs in the summertime!) and then slipped into her dress. It did float beautifully around her, she admitted, and she never felt overwhelmed in it. How lucky she was to have aunts who knew so well what sort of clothing suited her!

Her navy dress shoes (with the _tiniest_ heel—Dad didn't approve of anything higher, and Gwen was fairly certain she would trip even if he allowed it), were last, and then she was back downstairs to Aunt Ruth's room for help with her hair and the "hint of powder" and "soft pink lipstick."

Aunt Ruth was a whiz with a brush and pins, and in no time Gwen's flyaway curls were tamed into soft waves. Then the powder and lipstick, and with only the briefest, startled glance at the stranger in the mirror, Gwen kissed everyone and headed out, not wanting to be late.

She met up with Mary and Van and Lucy Douglas at Rainbow Valley. Van was scowling, and the two girls looked exasperated.

"What's wrong?" Gwen asked.

"Van's grumpy because Fanny isn't coming," Lucy explained.

Gwen raised her eyebrows. "I didn't know you and Fanny were a couple, Van."

"We are sometimes," he said. "Except she keeps fighting with me, and then making up, and then fighting again. I don't understand women, Gwen."

Although Gwen wanted to laugh at his disgruntled tone, she couldn't help but feel sympathy for him, and indignation toward Fanny. If she was still in love with Jack, she shouldn't be playing with Van's heart like this.

"So why isn't Fanny coming?" she asked.

Van shrugged. "She just said she had something else happening, but she wouldn't tell me what."

"Well," Mary said. "Let's try to have a good time without her, shall we?" Her overly patient tone suggested this wasn't the first time she had said that.

"I'm so excited for you all to meet Hayden and Ava," Gwen said brightly. "They are splendid people; I know you'll all like them."

Van only scowled more, and Lucy looked doubtful, but Mary nodded serenely. "It was awfully nice of your grandmother to invite me," she said. "I don't get much socialization here, although I'm always busy at college."

Gwen thought she knew why there was a difference. It was that Glen small-mindedness again. Mary was a fisherman's daughter, _not_ the same "quality" as the rest of the Glen folk, despite her schooling and veterinary training by Persis Blythe. Gwen was glad the people at Mary's college had enough clear-sightedness to look past her friend's background and recognize her worth.

"Who—um—else is coming?" Lucy asked.

"I'm not sure," Gwen said. "The other Owls, of course, but I don't know if Grandmother invited anyone else."

"We'll find out soon enough," Mary said, motioning to the well-lit Ingleside. "Looks as though we are some of the last to arrive."

Grandmother had indeed invited all the other Owls: Oliver was there, as well as Jean Drew and her brother Hank, and Lucy's especial friend Cathy MacAllister. Leigh and Owen Blythe had been included as a matter of course, and to Gwen's relief, they were chatting casually with Hayden and Ava, despite the covert looks the others were shooting them.

Ava wasn't wearing her trousers this evening, but was dressed in a very simple bias-cut dress with buttons holding the sleeves to the bodice and a cunning little back belt around her waist. The pale mauve colour highlighted her fair skin and dark hair and eyes, and looking at it compared with the ruffles and lace of the other girls' dresses, Gwen had to admit Aunt Ruth was right: simplicity and style was _always_ superior to frills and fuss.

Gwen was on her way to say hello to them when a familiar face half-hidden in the shadows of the garden caught her eyes. Her heart skipped a beat in pleasure, and without even thinking she abandoned her original quest and stepped toward him instead.

"Tryg," she said warmly, holding out her hand. "How are you?"


	6. Chapter 6

Tryg grinned and briefly squeezed her hand. "Hello, Gwen."

He had changed considerably since she had last seen him—grown into his shoulders and chest, filled up and out. His face, more than Oliver or Van or any other of the Glen boys, had made that indefinable yet unmistakable chance from boyhood to manhood. Gwen felt suddenly shy.

"I didn't know you were going to be here," she said, taking refuge in civilities. A moment before, she had been planning on asking him all about his artwork and his family, but now she was very unsure of herself.

"Your grandfather invited me, and Uncle said he didn't need me tonight, so here I am." At his easy words, Gwen started to feel a bit more comfortable again.

She couldn't understand _why_ she should suddenly be so nervous around Tryg—he was almost as much family as Jack and Owen, even if she had only seen him a few times. The picture he had given her, the one he had drawn of the Viking ship, was amongst her most prized possessions. At home, it hung right next to the Vermeer print, above her desk, where they both served as inspiration for her stories. Tryg was one of the few people outside her family who knew about her writing. She certainly had no reason to feel shy, just because he had grown up a little!

She was opening her mouth to ask him about his art, when Hayden joined them.

"There's the lady of the hour," he cried. He nodded at Tryg. "Hullo. I don't believe we've met?"

"Trygve Ahlberg," that young man said.

"Hayden Wentworth," he replied, shaking Tryg's hand. Hayden slung his free arm over Gwen's shoulders. "Do you mind if I steal Gwen for a bit? Her grandmother is asking for her."

"Not at all," Tryg said. "Gwen, see you later."

Gwen felt unreasonably disappointed, but Hayden's light banter on the way to find Grandmother soon had her laughing, and before long Tryg slipped from her mind. She glanced over at one point later in the evening to see he and Mary talking intently, and was surprised at the twinge she felt, but then Oliver distracted her with a question about Phil, and she lost track of Tryg again.

Between Oliver and Hayden, Gwen didn't actually have much of a chance to talk to anyone else. Oliver kept rather obviously trying to speak to her in private, and Hayden just as obviously took great delight in thwarting his every attempt. Oliver was speechless with fury after a while but Hayden's cheeky grin never slipped. Gwen wondered if he even realized how angry he was making Oliver, or if he just looked at it all as a big joke.

"Oh, everything's a joke to Hay," Ava said when Gwen obliquely brought up the matter during a brief period when the two girls were alone together. "It honestly doesn't occur to him that other people take him seriously." Her eyes, glimmering in the moonlight, were suddenly concerned. "He never means harm, Gwen—I hope you didn't think he had serious intentions toward you."

"Oh, no," Gwen assured her.

"I'm sure he would, if he could," Ava rushed on. "It's just—well, it's terribly old-fashioned and ridiculous, but our father expects him to marry well, you know? And not that there's anything wrong with your family, but you're not—well, not our class, and oh bother, I'm making this sound dreadful. Are you quite angry?"

Gwen laughed. "Not at all. You are talking to the queen of social gaffes. I do understand, Ava. Even if my family happened to be the best in Canada, we're still Canadian, aren't we? We're not English."

"No," Ava said. "You're not." She studied Gwen for a moment. "I wish Hay could marry anyone he liked, and that he liked you. I think you'd make a grand sister, Canadian or not."

"Well, thank you."

"But to return to Hay—because he knows his future is settled—he has to marry well, he has to join the Navy, he has to inherit the hall—he doesn't think about his actions now. He just does whatever he likes and assumes everything will just settle." She shrugged helplessly.

"Leaving you to pick up the pieces behind him?" Gwen asked.

Ava smiled crookedly. "What else are sisters for? I don't know what Hay will do when he's in the Navy and I have to stay home. Nobody else will get him out of his scrapes like I can."

"I never get in scrapes," Hayden said, popping up beside them without warning.

"Only because I keep you out of them," Ava said.

"True," he admitted with a wide grin. "Gwen, will you dance with me?"

"I'm a terrible dancer," Gwen said. "Besides, there's no music."

"Ah, but if we start dancing, perhaps somebody will take the hint and provide us with music."

"I'm still a terrible dancer."

"I would ask the lovely Lucy, but I am in mortal fear of her mother. Just one dance, please?"

Gwen couldn't hold out against that pleading face. "Don't blame me when you go home with bruised toes."

Hayden took her hand and kissed it gallantly. "Not one word."

He swept her onto the lawn and into one of the latest dances, humming a tune. Surprisingly, Gwen found she didn't do so badly, following his lead. His arms were strong and sure, and his eyes were so full of suppressed fun that she forgot all about her clumsiness and just surrendered to the moment.

As Hayden whirled her around and around, she caught glimpses of the faces all around them: Oliver, dark red and scowling; Grandfather, looking both amused and concerned; Mary, placid as usual; Lynde looking wistful (no doubt thinking of Jack); Lucy, showing a scandalized face; Grandmother smiling like a girl.

Then she was too dizzy to see anything, and she closed her eyes and gave herself up to the giddy feeling in her legs and head.

* * *

Tryg was not jealous of Hayden Wentworth. Not at all. To be jealous would be to assume that he had ever had a chance with Gwen Blake, and Tryg wasn't that foolish.

Not that he was in love with Gwen. He wouldn't aspire so high. Who was he but a boy living on his uncle's charity, with no future but a farm he hated? Gwen deserved better. She would get better.

No, he wasn't in love with Gwen, and he wasn't jealous of Hayden Wentworth, but Tryg had to admit to himself, as he started the long walk back from Ingleside to the Arnold farm over-harbour, that he hadn't very much enjoyed seeing her dancing in Wentworth's arms.

Tryg had only ever had one opportunity to dance with Gwen, and he had passed that up to give her a chance to rest. He didn't regret that, as it had led to a conversation he still cherished in his memory, but he couldn't help but wish he had the memory of dancing with her, as well.

He pictured her again as she had been while dancing with Wentworth: eyes shining like the stars overhead, mouth curved in a full, un-self-conscious smile, the moon reflecting off her golden hair, her entire being showing her pure enjoyment in being alive.

He would sketch her like that, he decided. Only instead of being in Wentworth's arms, she would be—no, not in his, he wouldn't presume—but with a mystery figure. Where the moon and stars shone fully on Gwen, illuminating her beauty, the man with whom she danced would remain in shadow, just a dim figure, only to be revealed …

Well, sometime.

Tryg's artist's eye rejoiced in the beauty of the walk along the harbour. The sea, a wordless song, whispered to his left as he walked along, singing to him of hope and promise. The light flashed out regularly, illuminating the world for just a moment before leaving it all dark again, just a memory of what had been.

To his right were houses and people, sleeping human beings all tucked safely in their beds, dreaming their staid dreams and awaiting tomorrow's chores.

Adventure and comfort, side-by-side. Two choices, one on the left, and one on the right. Tryg worried at his lower lip with his teeth.

The words he had spoken to Gwen at the Midwinter Ball were not quite so true as they once had been. Then, he had no other choice but to remain with his uncle, working the farm as a way of paying him back for taking them all in after Tryg's father died. His sister had a future in music; any extra money went to her education. Pursuing art was just not possible, no matter how badly he wanted it.

And oh, he did want it. He wanted a proper education, he wanted to see the world, to rejoice in its beauty and help heal its ugliness. He wanted to learn how to improve his craft, how to be the best artist he could possibly be. He hated farming.

Then, though, it was all he had. Now things looked slightly different. Anja had won a full scholarship to go on to music school; she didn't need Tryg's or Uncle's support. Aunt was looking ill these days, and Uncle had been talking about selling the farm and moving out west for her health. Mother would go with them, of course, as her health had always been delicate, but Uncle had told Tryg that it was up to him whether he accompanied them or not.

There was no money for his schooling, of course, but for the first time in his life, Tryg was faced with the opportunity to work for his own future, not someone else's.

And he didn't know if he was ready to take it. It would be far easier to stay with his family, keep working with Uncle, let the dreams go. Yet could he live with his own cowardice if he did that? Could he spend the rest of his life knowing he had given up his one chance, just because he was afraid?

Would he choose comfort over adventure?

His mind flashed back to Gwen. He wished he could talk about it with her. Most people, he knew, would tell him to go for it, to take his chance and never look back. Gwen, though … Gwen would understand his dilemma. She would help him know what he ought to do.

He didn't want to interfere with anything between her and Wentworth, though. Or Grant. It looked to him like Grant was in love with Gwen, but so far as Tryg could tell she seemed to prefer Wentworth. Tryg couldn't blame her. Wentworth was dashing and exciting; any girl would be in love with him.

In either case, Tryg didn't want them—or Gwen—thinking that he was butting in. Reluctantly, he decided against seeking Gwen out.

He wouldn't want her to get the wrong idea.

* * *

Gwen filled Aunt Ruth and the twins in on the party the next morning, until Uncle Bruce clutched his ears and staggered moaning out onto the porch.

"Men," Aunt Ruth sniffed, dismissing him with barely a glance. "Tell me more about dancing with Hayden, Gwen."

Gwen kept talking, right up until they left for church. Winnie and Ruthie wanted to hear more even then, but Uncle Bruce sternly informed them that one mention of the word "party" would result in him _not_ taking them swimming down at the shore that afternoon. That threat was enough to silence both twins.

The Wentworths and their uncle attended the Episcopalian church, but Lucy Douglas whispered to Gwen after the service that her mother had decided that if the Blythes approved of the siblings, they must not be so bad.

"She was especially relieved to hear about you and Hayden," she said.

"Me and Hayden?" Gwen asked, too amazed to even think about grammar.

Lucy nodded. "When I told her that you and Hayden were walking out together, she said that he must be all right, if Mrs. Ruth and Dr. Bruce, and Dr. and Mrs. Blythe allowed it."

"But Lucy, Hay and I are only friends," Gwen said.

Lucy looked scornful. "Gwen, if you wanted to keep it a secret, you shouldn't have danced with him like that last night." She wrinkled her nose. "Personally, I think Mum's just happy that he's taken, so now she doesn't have to worry about me. As if I would ever be interested in someone like that!" She tossed her head and moved off, leaving Gwen standing helplessly in place.

"Oh dear," she said unhappily.

She told Aunt Ruth about it that afternoon, while Uncle Bruce and the girls were at the shore. Her aunt only laughed.

"Well, didn't you think people would talk?"

"I didn't really think about it at all," Gwen said. "It was so obvious to me that Hay was only flirting … I assumed everyone else would know it too."

"Look at it this way," Aunt Ruth said. "You wanted to help the Glen folk accept the Wentworths, and now they have. Even if it is partially because they think you and Hayden are walking out, does that hurt anyone? So long as you and Hayden know the truth, what does it matter? The summer will end, you will go back to Kingsport, and Hayden and Ava will go back to England, and it will all be forgotten."

And maybe, Gwen thought, if Oliver believed it, he wouldn't bother her at all this summer. She was still uneasy—it still felt like living a lie—but she soothed her conscience with the old saying: least said, soonest mended. If she tried to explain to everyone, things would just end up getting more tangled.

Besides, Chloe was going to be arriving soon, and Gwen couldn't resist the stab of satisfaction she felt at the thought of her cousin's face when she heard that Gwen and handsome, charming, wealthy Hayden Wentworth were a couple.

She was only human, after all.


	7. Chapter 7

"Grandmother, Grandfather!" Chloe Ford cried, leaping out of the car and spreading her arms wide with a flourish. "We're here!"

Gwen stifled a giggle at her cousin's dramatic air. Then she saw how much lovelier Chloe had gotten since two summers past, and the giggle turned to a stifled sigh.

"Pretty or not, she's still a scheming minx," Lynde said quietly at her side.

Gwen smiled wryly.

Chloe was now thirteen, and was unfairly skipping the awkward stage. Even Aunt Rilla had been all arms and legs for a while, Gwen thought indignantly. Uncle Jem _still_ sometimes called her Spider, just to make her mad. Why did Chloe get to still be petite and dainty and beautiful? They had been travelling for ages to get to the Island, over ferry and on train, yet Chloe's ruffled yellow dress was still fresh and crisp, her dark hair still smooth and neat, and even her stockings were unwrinkled!

Before Gwen could succumb to too much jealousy of her younger cousin, the twins exited the car behind her, and Gwen forgot all about everything else in her eagerness to see Isaiah.

Red-headed Isaac gave her a wide, wary berth, but Isaiah submitted patiently to her enthusiastic hug. He was fifteen now, and opposed to all forms of physical affection, but he was fond enough of Gwen to accept a hug.

"Sorry," she said, pulling back after a moment. "I forgot."

"That's OK," he said with a grin. "I expected you to."

Aunt Rilla and Uncle Ken followed their offspring out of the vehicle, and the next several moments were taken up in a chaos of hugs and greetings all around. Uncle Jerry and Aunt Nan had arrived at the manse the day before, so sweet Rosie and impish Gil were on hand for the cousins, and Leigh and Owen were there naturally as well. Knowing the younger Merediths, Gwen fully expected to see Tommy, Lizzie, and Celia tearing through Rainbow Valley shortly, desperately afraid that they were missing out on the good times. Winnie and Ruthie had come down from the West House with her: all the young fry were together, with a few notable exceptions.

"It just doesn't seem right to have you all here and not Jack," Owen grumbled.

"I miss Phil," Gil said. Perhaps because of their similar age, or the fact that their mothers were twins, or even because of their rhyming nicknames, Gil and Phil were the best of friends—nearly as close as Gwen and Jeremy.

"No Jack, no Phil, no Lee, and no Jo," Owen counted on his hands. "Is this it? Is it the beginning of the end? Are we always going to be separated now, no hope of all of us being united ever again?"

"Goodness Owen, I thought Chloe was the one with the gift for drama," Leigh said. "Are you preparing for a Shakespeare tragedy?"

Chloe planted her hands on her hips. "And what is _that_ supposed to mean, Leigh Anne Blythe?"

"Simply that Owen sounds ridiculous," Leigh said calmly.

"Oh, so you think drama is ridiculous?"

"It is from Owen," Rosie giggled, and when even the young man in question roared over that, Chloe couldn't keep up her wounded air any longer.

"But what will we _do_ without Jack?" she asked plaintively. "He's never been gone during a summer before. Why did Uncle Jem and Aunt Faith have to take him to India with them? It isn't fair."

"Perhaps he wanted to go," Gil suggested, flopping down onto the grass and crossing his arms beneath his head. Gwen exchanged a quick glance with Owen and Leigh. Apparently none of the other cousins knew about Jack and Lynde. By that wordless communication that can only exist in families, the three who knew agreed to keep it to themselves. Even Owen wouldn't do anything to hurt Lynde—or Jack.

"India is pretty exciting, after all," Rosie agreed, settling down next to her brother. She smoothed her pretty pink dress over her knees. Rosie didn't have Chloe's glamour, but Gwen thought she looked just like her namesake—a sweet, soft, pink rose, blossoming in the sun and withering in the cold and rain. She'd inherited her mother's nut-brown hair and eyes, but her dreaminess and gentleness of character came directly from her Grandfather Meredith. "Do you suppose he'll get to ride an elephant?"

Isaac suddenly snorted. "Just fancy Jack done up like a young rajah," he said, and they all burst into gales of laughter at the image.

* * *

"Bless the children," Anne Blythe said, listening to the laughter coming from Rainbow Valley. "Some things never change, no matter how the world shifts. There will always be laughter, and always rainbows."

"You'll never change, either, Mother," Nan said, hugging her mother warmly. "You always see the hopeful side of life." She gave a little sigh. "I fail in that area too often."

Nan never complained, but they all knew how very different her life had been, becoming a farmwife in Avonlea to accommodate her husband's shell-shock, instead of rising in society to assist Jerry's brilliant career in … whatever it was he did.

They also all knew that she never regretted for a second giving up her girlish dreams for Jerry's health. It was a difficult life, though, and as much as Jerry had recovered of his old self in the fields and woods of Avonlea, and the simple, hearty life of a farmer, he would never again be the remarkable, bright boy he had once been, about whom Anne Blythe had once said, even over her own children, he was "the cleverest pupil in the Glen school," and "destined to a brilliant career."

Betty Meredith hugged her sister-in-law back. Betty was always a little awed in these family gatherings, but Rilla Blythe had been one of her dearest friends when they were girls, and Betty had put aside her shyness in order to greet her today.

"Dear Nan," she said in her soft voice.

Nan smiled and shook her head. "Well, no need to get maudlin. Goodness, it's been ages since I've had a good gossip with my sisters and mother! Come, let's get our lemonade and sit on the verandah and talk everyone and everything over until our tongues are exhausted. I've been waiting all year for this!"

"It's a good thing Diana isn't here," Rilla said, gathering glasses while Betty balanced the heavy pitcher. Anne had given Lynde strict instructions to go socialize with the other young fry, and the women rather enjoyed puttering about Ingleside's kitchen on their own for a change.

"Why is that?" Betty asked.

"She doesn't approve of gossip."

"Oh, Di enjoys a bit of gossip as much as the next person," Nan said. "She's just never sure she should listen to it, being a minister's wife and all. How glad I am I don't have that on my conscience!"

"I'm afraid I don't have much for gossip," Persis said, slicing bread with startling efficiency. "Unless you'd all like to hear about what the inside of the Glen farmers' barns are all like. I spend so much of my time with the farmers, their wives never stop to share gossip with me."

"Everyone is scared of you, Persis dear," Anne said with a laugh. "They never know when you're going to roar at them for something."

Persis laughed and shrugged her still-elegant shoulders. "Well, I can't abide mean-spirited people, and gossip that does nothing but tear others down. Chatting over events? That's one thing, but spreading foolish and hurtful rumours …" Her brows drew together in a scowl, and the women all shivered a little.

"I suppose that's why Mary didn't come up to say hello, then," Nan said. "She can't keep herself from mean-spirited gossip any more than she can from breathing."

"Oh, but Mary never means harm," Betty protested. "She doesn't realize that her words might hurt somebody."

By now the women were all settled on the verandah with lemonade and sweetbread. Anne was in the middle, her daughters and friends spread out to either side. The only thing, she thought, that could make this better would be if dear Rosemary and Ruth could be here as well, instead of stuck up at the old West House so Gwen and the twins could see their cousins.

"Mary is so absorbed in giving her children the best that she's forgotten about her own less than conventional past," Nan said. "She insists that everybody be proper all the time, but certainly _she_ never worried herself about that."

"Oh, I don't think you're quite fair to Mary," Anne said. "Especially after dear Miss Cornelia took her in, she did her best to live up to her standards. Her tongue has always been sharp, that's all."

"I'm sure you're right, Mother," Nan said with a laugh. "Mary and I have always had our differences, that's all."

"So have we," Persis said.

"She was so good to Jims," Rilla said with a smile. "I've never felt comfortable holding anything against her after she saved his life that time."

"How is Jims?" Anne asked. "We hear so little about him these days."

Rilla beamed and began to boast—just a little—about her almost-son, as she called him. Jims was twenty-four now, graduated from McGill with honours in engineering, and was now busily working at a big firm in Toronto, designing bridges.

"My only complaint with Jims is that he won't settle down to get married," Rilla ended with a little sigh. "Every time he calls—he calls me once a month, you know, just to check in—he has a new girlfriend. I keep asking him when he's going to pick one and stay with her, and he just laughs."

"Jims never did like other people telling him what to do," Nan observed, bringing out her knitting. "Maybe if you asked him less, he'd think about it more."

Rilla did her sister the justice of considering the matter seriously. "Perhaps," she conceded. "But then the suspense of not knowing would surely kill me!"

The laughter that rang out from Ingleside's verandah rivalled that coming from Rainbow Valley.

"What are you working on, Nan?" Betty asked, bringing her own sewing out. She was mending a shirt for Tommy, as her boy tore the sleeves out of all his elbows by spending all his time with his nose to the ground, studying soil conditions.

"A sweater for Jack, to take with him to school this fall," Nan said. She held it out. "Isn't the wool pretty? I thought this blue would go so nicely with his grey eyes and black hair."

"It will be very handsome, Nan." Anne smiled at her daughter. "You always were the finest knitter in the family. Rilla never had the patience, nor Di the temperament."

"Di could sew up a dress that looked professionally tailored, but she did so hate knitting," Nan agreed. "Oh dear, it just seems so odd to have all of us here without Faith and Di. I understand that Di and Jon want to stay close to Mount Holly this summer, and I know that Faith would never pass up a chance to see Una in India, but it feels as though we're missing half of us."

"I think wanting to take Jack away from Lynde had more to do with Faith and Jem leaving than wanting to see Una," Persis remarked sharply. She and Rilla alone were not doing handwork, and Persis' long, slender fingers plucked restlessly at the arms of her wicker chair.

"Oh come now, Persis," Rilla said soothingly. "You make it sound as though Faith and Jem are such snobs. You wouldn't want to see Jack marry Lynde, would you? You can't blame them for wanting to clear his head a little."

"Why shouldn't Jack marry Lynde?" Persis asked.

Rilla shook her head, and Nan clicked her tongue. Betty looked distressed.

"No, but really," Persis continued. "Jack is a fine boy, and Lynde a lovely woman. She is a hard worker, already knows how to run a household, better than most of us, if the truth be told, and is loyal and honest to a fault. So she isn't ambitious, and doesn't come from an exalted background. Why should that matter?"

"It shouldn't, of course," Anne said crisply, before her daughters could speak. "And to do them justice, Persis, I don't think Jem and Faith like the idea of Jack being in love with anyone. It has little to do with Lynde as a person, as I had to explain to Gwen. She was quite as indignant on her friend's behalf as you are."

"I always knew I liked Gwen," Persis grinned. "And I suppose I can see it from Jem and Faith's point of view, too. Leigh is fifteen now, and already the boys are flocking around her, and I can assure you that none of them are good enough for my girl. Nobody would be."

"All parents are 'snobs,' when it comes to our children's futures," Nan said. "Spouses, schools, friends … we want them to have the best of everything."

"Even we who had the perfect childhood," Rilla said, laying an affectionate hand on her mother's arm, "Want our children to be even happier than we were."

"I think we can all agree in praying they are spared the years of war we endured," Betty said softly.

"Amen to that," Nan said, a cloud hovering over her still-smooth forehead. She thought of her husband, and then of her son, who was bursting with all the promise his father had once had, and knew a moment of chill fear beyond anything she had endured even during the darkest days of the Great War.

Rilla said nothing, but her eyes took on the sorrowful gaze they always did when she thought of Walter, and she remembered again the superstitious reason she had not named either of her boys for him … the fear that his namesake would die as early a death.

Persis, who had worked as a VAD, knew more firsthand about the horrors of the war than any of the others there, and shuddered to think of her nieces and nephews—maybe even her own children—seeing and enduring the things she had witnessed during her four years.

Betty, who had lost a cousin and more friends than she liked to remember, thanked God that her Tommy was still only twelve, and more interested in dirt than guns.

And Anne looked out over the horizon, listening to the sounds of her grandchildren making merry in the valley, and remembered a previous generation whose merriment had come to an end too soon. Sometimes, the doctor's wife thought sadly, she thought she had lived too long in the world, a world that had gone mad.

"Enough of this talk," Rilla said, raising a hand in front of her face as though brushing away mental cobwebs. "Mother, how is Ruth?"

Anne brightened at once. After all, even when a world was teetering on the edge of chaos, babies were still being born and bringing delight to all who knew them. "She is doing so well, especially since Gwen came. What a change in that girl from a few years ago! She is so competent now, and she keeps West House running smoothly. Winnie and Ruthie adore her, and I don't think Bruce and Ruth will ever want to let her go back home."

"As long as she manages to keep from tripping over her own feet while running things," Nan said, Gwen's clumsiness being legendary in the family.

"Gwen _has_ improved greatly," Rilla said, with the air of one determined to be fair. "I have never really been able to get close to her—she seems so much more Blake than Blythe, if you know what I mean—but I can tell she is much calmer and controlled than she was as a child."

"And she has a new young man friend," Betty volunteered.

"What? Our Gwen?" Nan said, frankly astonished.

Betty nodded, pleased to be passing information that was still new. "It's all over the village that she and Hayden Wentworth are seeing each other."

"Oh, that," Persis said, waving a hand dismissively. "I'm sure they're just friends, Betty. I don't think Hayden is Gwen's type at all."

Anne sighed. "For a while I hoped that she and Oliver Grant would make a match of it. I liked the thought of a granddaughter of mine marrying one of Gertrude's children."

"You still yet may get your wish, Mother," Rilla laughed. "Chloe has been insisting since she was a child that she is going to marry Oliver someday, and you know how determined she is!"

"Yes, yes," Nan said, brushing aside these trivialities. "But who is Hayden Wentworth? Is he good enough for our Gwen?"

"Hayden and his sister Ava are very charming," Anne said firmly. "I must say Hayden seems a bit more flippant than I can wholly approve in a young man … but there, I'm old-fashioned, I know. Certainly he seems to like Gwen very much. Ruth would probably know more about Gwen's feelings."

"I'll have to ask her, then," Nan said. "After all, since Di isn't here, it's my duty to my twin to know what's going on with Gwen."

"Oh, Nan!" Rilla laughed. "Admit it, you just can't keep your nose out of other people's romances."

"Neither can you, or have you forgotten Miranda and Joe?" Nan retorted.

"I fear I have passed my hopeless matchmaking onto my daughters," Anne murmured to Persis, who shook her magnificent head in response.

"I have never been interested, myself, but I still think you're all wrong about Gwen and Hayden. Gwen has too much sense to fall for someone so careless."

"Girls never have sense when it comes to handsome young men," Nan said mournfully, overhearing this, and with that everyone else had to agree.


	8. Chapter 8

"I tell you what, Gwen, I'm glad you're staying with Aunt Ruth this summer."

"Why is that?" Gwen asked her cousin. The two were sprawled on West House's back lawn. They could hear the twins' shrill voices from down the hill, as they argued and discussed the laying-out of their new playhouse, but aside from a few birds and an inquisitive rabbit, they were all alone.

Isaiah grinned, transforming his dark, sulky face. "Because nobody is around, and since you're on top of a hill, you can hear and see people coming before they see you, and that gives you a chance to hide."

Gwen threw a couple pieces of grass at him. "Oh, Isaiah!" At least he was honest. "You still don't like people, then?"

"Nope," he said, shaking his head. "Don't see any point in liking them that don't like me."

"People might like you better if you were more friendly," Gwen countered.

"Wasn't born to be friendly, not like you. You can make friends with anyone, even those stuck-up Wentworth snobs. Me, even when I try to be friendly it comes out wrong. So I don't try anymore. I leave people alone, and they leave me alone, and everyone's happy."

Gwen decided to let his insult of Ava and Hayden slide. She suspected he'd mentioned them only to try to get a rise out of her. "Isaiah, when was the last time you did try to be friendly?"

He pondered. "About six years ago, I guess."

Gwen laughed. "Oh Isaiah, don't you think you might have changed since then?"

"Nope."

She gave it up. At least he was friends with her—although that might have been because Gwen found his appalling bluntness amusing rather than insulting.

"What about Isaac?"

"What about him?"

"Does he make friends?"

Isaiah's shrug was a marvellous specimen of unconcern. "Isaac adapts to whomever he's around. He can be friendly, or rude, or whatever. Nobody really knows what he's thinking or feeling on the inside."

"Not even you?"

One thick dark eyebrow rose. "Just because we're twins?"

"Well, yes." Gwen couldn't help but feel defensive.

Isaiah snorted. "Your mum and Aunt Nan may have a special twin bond, but the only thing Isaac and I ever had in common was when we would gang up to annoy people. When I stopped doing that—because of _you_—Isaac stopped too, and now we barely even talk to each other."

Gwen knew Isaiah hated being pitied, but she couldn't help the wave of sorrow that swamped her at his words. She was so close with all her siblings (and none of them were even twins); she couldn't imagine having a brother or sister she barely knew.

"What about Chloe, is she close to you or Isaac?"

Isaiah snorted again. "Chloe is close to Chloe. She only cares about us as she can boss us around, or if we do something noteworthy she can brag about."

Gwen didn't quite know what to say in response to that.

"She won't be causing problems for you this summer, though," Isaiah said, apparently not noticing her silence.

"That's good," Gwen said. "Why? Did you talk to her?"

"Nope. Lizzie told her you had a new boyfriend, that Wentworth, and so she thinks she's got another shot with Oliver."

Gwen made an exasperated noise under her breath. Then the curious note in Isaiah's voice registered. It was the same tone he'd used when scorning Ava and Hay before.

"Isaiah," she blurted without thinking, "Are you jealous of Hay?"

He sat bolt upright. "Of course not! What d'you think I am? You're my cousin, not some dumb girl I might have a crush on. I don't like girls, anyway. They're stupid. I thought you were different, but I guess you're just like all the rest, thinking every fellow is in love with you, even if he's your cousin or a friend."

"Sorry, sorry!" Gwen exclaimed. She could have slapped herself. When would she learn to think before speaking? "I didn't mean it like that, I just … look, if you suddenly had a new friend here in the Glen, when I'd been looking forward to spending all this time with you, I'd be a little jealous. Not because I'm in love with you, but because I wasn't expecting to have to share you. That's all I meant."

"Oh." Isaiah slowly stretched himself back out on the velvety grass again. "Well, I'm still not jealous of him. Of course you're going to have other friends beside me—you have _loads_ of friends."

"Then why don't you like Hayden?"

Isaiah wriggled and squirmed. Red infused his cheeks as he finally said, "Just don't think he's good enough for you, that's all."

Gwen nearly blushed herself at such an extravagant compliment from taciturn Isaiah. "Well, thank you," she said, composing herself with an effort. "But you needn't worry. Despite what everyone thinks, Hay and I are just friends, just like Ava and I are. Really," she added, seeing the skepticism on his face.

"Then why haven't you told people that?"

"I wanted to, but Aunt Ruth said there wouldn't be any point; people would just think I was being coy. Besides …" She trailed off, not really sure how much she wanted to share with him about Oliver.

He was nodding. "Makes sense. People believe what they want, no matter what you say. But why do you do so much with him, then? Seems like every day the two of you are together."

"What, just because I go to the coffee shop on my free hour? They have good coffee," Gwen said lamely. Very few people, still, knew about her writing endeavours, and as much as she liked Isaiah, she didn't want to open herself up to his scorn by admitting she liked to go to the café for the atmosphere. She always felt cleverer there than she did anywhere else, and the words that poured from her pen seemed wittier.

Besides, Ava's companionship and Hay's flattering nonsense were _fun_.

Isaiah began to count on his fingers. "You go to the café every day. You and Hayden go out together every Friday, your day off. He comes up here a few times a week when he's done work. You often go for a walk on Sunday after church. Did I miss anything"?

Gwen stared at him. "You've been here less than a week," she said in a stunned voice. "How do you know all this?"

"I told you, Lizzie's been talking to Chloe, and Isaac and I were close enough to hear. Well?"

It did sound convincing, hearing it from Isaiah's mouth. Did she really spend that much time with Hay? True, Ava was often along on those Friday excursions, and she usually joined them on their Sunday walks, but she rarely came up to the house with Hay, and many times it was just Gwen and Hay on Fridays. Gwen bit her lip. How to explain the freedom she felt when she was with Hay? She could flirt and laugh and not feel as though she were leading him on, or even making a fool of herself. They never did anything inappropriate—he was a perfect gentleman—but she didn't feel bound to the confines of Glen propriety when she was with him.

"He's fun and different," was what she finally said. "He makes me laugh. Ava's a darling, and I just like spending time with both of them. They aren't like anybody else I know, and, I don't know, I guess I'd just rather spend time with them than anyone else here, except you or Lynde. And you just got here, and Lynde and I hardly ever have free time at the same time, so I just end up spending most of my time with Hay and Ava."

"Well," Isaiah said wisely, "If you don't want people to think you're a couple, you probably shouldn't spend so much time with him."

"Probably not," Gwen sighed, but inside she felt stubborn. She wasn't going to let the narrow-mindedness of people in the Glen stop her from enjoying Hay and Ava's friendship. Besides, they probably all still thought her a hussy anyway, thanks to Chloe. Grandmother Meredith had stopped the rumours, but even she couldn't change people's opinions.

If they already thought her scandalous and improper, why should she change her actions to suit them?

* * *

"Hullo, Gwen," Hayden said, sauntering through the kitchen door as though he had been born and bred in the Glen. He grinned at the two little girls sitting at the table eating cherries. "Hullo Winnie, Ruthie."

They grinned back. Hay was quite the favourite around the West House. Winnie liked the fact that he was never too proper or old to get down on the floor and play; Ruthie admired him because he was so handsome and had such a lovely voice. Aunt Ruth liked him for his unfailing courtesy, and Uncle Bruce instinctively sized him up as a good man underneath all his flippant airs.

Then Hay took in the small, dark boy sitting in the other corner. "I don't think I've met you yet. Hayden Wentworth."

"Isaiah Ford," Gwen's cousin said shortly.

Hayden's eyebrows flew to the top of his head. "Any relation to the Chloe Ford who came into the café yesterday to tell me all about her _dear_ cousin Gwen and Gwen's long-standing _understanding_ with her cousin on the other side, one Jeremy Blake?"

Gwen groaned and Isaiah laughed.

"I thought you said Chloe was going to leave me alone this summer, Isaiah," Gwen said.

"I thought she was. Oliver must have let her know he still wasn't interested in her."

"So she decided to take her disappointment out on me by trying to make Hay think I'm promised to Jeremy?"

"It does sound like Chloe, doesn't it?"

It certainly did. Gwen turned to Hay, who was watching the conversation with a twinkle in his eye.

"What did you tell her?"

"Oh, just that you had told me all about Jeremy, and he certainly sounded like a nice chap, and that it was lucky for me he wasn't here this summer or he'd probably thrash me for being so free with his cousin, eh?"

Gwen giggled. "Oh dear, she must not have liked that."

"She did glare rather, but she left before explaining anything, why she had come in to tell me this without any kind of introduction, or why she was so concerned for Jeremy, or anything."

"I'll leave you to explain it, Gwen," Isaiah said, un-propping himself from the wall. "Mum and Dad are taking us all over-harbour for dinner with friends today, and Mum will throw twenty fits if I'm late for getting ready. See you tomorrow?"

"Of course," Gwen said. "Have fun at dinner."

"Not likely," he said, as he vanished out the door.

"So," Hayden said. "Do you want to tell me about Chloe?"

Gwen looked at the two eager little faces sitting at the table. "Not really."

"I'll tell you," Winnie said. "I was only little, but I remember. You see, Chloe—"

"Winnie!"

Hay snagged a handful of cherries from the bowl on the table. "Go on, Winnie."

Gwen's stern glare encompassed both of them. "Do not go on, Winnie. It's nothing, Hay. Chloe and I have never been friends, that's all."

Hayden sat down on the edge of the table. "You know," he said around a mouthful of ruby fruit. "It occurred to me—belatedly, I confess—that if Chloe thought I'd be distressed to hear about your _understanding_ with Jeremy, it must be common thought that you and I … that we are …"

Gwen couldn't believe he was only just now realizing this. Ava had figured it out before either of them; Gwen assumed she would have told her brother the way people around the Glen thought.

"Never mind them," was all she said.

"I don't," Hay assured her. "I just wanted to make sure I wasn't making things awkward for _you_."

"Not at all," Gwen said.

His insouciant grin flashed out again. "Good. Then you won't mind if I ask you to have dinner with me tomorrow night?"

"Dinner? You mean … out? Together?" If the people of the Glen didn't already think them a couple, they certainly would after that.

"That's exactly what I mean. Well?"

Gwen wasn't sure if she was disappointed or relieved over having to say, "I can't. Isaiah and I are spending all day together tomorrow."

Hayden nodded, unconcerned. "Next Friday evening, then?"

Gwen swallowed. "All right," she said, reminding herself that she didn't care what people thought or said.

"Good. There's a restaurant in Maywood that Uncle Edward just heard about and wants my opinion on. I hate eating alone, and Ava doesn't like eating at restaurants, so I thought of you."

Gwen began to breathe easier. He wasn't actually asking her on a date, then. It was one thing to spend time with him and flirt with him without there being any meaning beneath it; it was another entirely to actually _be_ his girlfriend without either of them caring about each other. This was still just casually friendly.

"Can I come, too?" Winnie asked.

"May I," Gwen corrected automatically.

"Not this time, pet," Hayden said. "Tell you what, though: I'll treat you and Ruthie to lunch sometime next week. Deal?"

She nodded solemnly, and they shook hands on it, much to Gwen's amusement.

After Hayden left, leaving behind a bouquet of flowers for Aunt Ruth, Gwen wondered again what she had gotten herself into. Sometimes she felt like spending time with Hayden was like being in the midst of a whirlwind—breathless and fun, but no chance to think.

She wondered uneasily if Mother and Dad would approve of her relationship with Hay, or if they would disappointed in her for being so frivolous.

On the other hand, if one couldn't be frivolous at seventeen, when _could_ one?


	9. Chapter 9

Friday was a glorious day, sunny but not too hot, a blue sky with a few puffy white clouds floating through it, a fresh breeze coming off the sea,

"And a cousin to share it," Gwen smiled.

"And a picnic lunch packed by Lynde," Isaiah added, patting the basket.

"Yes, I'm glad to see you place me on the same level as filling your stomach."

"I'm a growing boy," he pointed out.

"You certainly are." Isaiah had stretched out considerably over the last few years, and was intent on filling out his length as soon as possible. "Poor Aunt Rilla, having to feed you and Isaac all the time!"

"And Chloe—you wouldn't guess it, looking at her, but she has a healthy appetite of her own. Some meals she eats more than Isaac and me combined!"

Gwen laughed and laughed at the thought of her dainty cousin shovelling food in to rival her brothers. When she finally calmed, she was surprised to find that sting of jealousy she had felt even since the Fords arrived was gone. Just hearing about Chloe's achilles heel was enough to soothe it.

Not that she would ever taunt her cousin with the information (for one thing, Chloe would know Isaiah had told her, and Gwen would never be mean enough to get him in trouble with his sister), but knowing that she was human and imperfect made all the difference in how Gwen viewed her.

"Enough about Chloe," she said. "Let's just enjoy the day God—I mean, let's enjoy the day."

Isaiah knew perfectly well that she had been about to say "let's enjoy the day God has given us," but since she stopped herself, he also refrained from saying something scathing about religion. Gwen noted his restraint, and they shared a rueful smile.

"Which direction are we going in, over-harbour or down past the lighthouse?"

"We did past the lighthouse all the time the last summer we were here," Isaiah said. "Let's explore over-harbour."

"There are more people there," Gwen warned.

"I know, but I also know there are lots of place along the shore where most folks don't bother going."

"After you, then," Gwen said.

Isaiah gave her one of his rare dazzling smiles. "Nah. We'll go together."

* * *

They did see a number of people, but most just waved and smiled. A few stopped to talk to "the doc's grandchildren," but Isaiah's scowl was enough to scare most of them away. Gwen felt uneasily that she ought to rebuke him for being rude. She didn't think he'd listen to her, though, and she was honestly rather glad that he was keeping them from being constantly interrupted.

"Next time, we're going back down past the lighthouse," Isaiah growled after the fifth person stopped to say hello. "We might have already explored most of it, but at least there's hardly anyone there."

Gwen graciously forbore from pointing out that she had mentioned this might happen. She just nodded and smiled.

"You did say there were some more abandoned spots?"

"This way," Isaiah pointed past the dunes, to a more rocky stretch of shore. "There are caves in there, so Dad's friend Mr. Berne tells me. It's no good fishing in that stretch, so only artists and other crazy types go there."

"Well, we fit into the crazy type category," Gwen said.

"Exactly. Don't you want to carry the basket for a while?"

Gwen smiled sweetly. "You're the one who asked Lynde to pack an extra-large lunch."

"We're eating as soon as we find a decent cave," Isaiah grunted.

Gwen didn't agree out loud, but after scrambling over rocks and wet sand for over an hour, she was feeling hungry as well. They squabbled amicably over a few caves—Isaiah insisting they were fine, and Gwen declaring that she was not going to eat lunch in a place that was likely to give her pneumonia because it was so damp and dark.

"Dark doesn't give you pneumonia," Isaiah said with brotherly disgust.

Gwen levelled her best glare at him. "It's the principle of the matter."

"What principle?" he muttered, completely disregarding the glare. Gwen mentally shrugged. It never worked on Jo or Phil, either.

Finally, they found one that satisfied them both. Isaiah liked the fact that it was far away from civilization, and Gwen approved of the large opening letting in light and air. They shook hands in satisfaction and entered, looking for flat rocks appropriate for holding their feast.

They found one only a few feet from the entrance—but it was already occupied. Isaiah was beginning to growl low in his throat, but the young man with the broad shoulders turned to face them at the sound of their voices, and Gwen recognized him.

"Hello, Tryg!" she said, feeling that small spurt of pleasure his appearance always inspired in her. "What brings you here today?"

He motioned to the paper and pens scattered over the rock. "Drawing," he said with the half-sheepish grin he usually wore when speaking of his craft.

Isaiah pushed past Gwen. "Say, that's not half bad," he admitted, looking at Tryg's partially finished picture.

Gwen, even in the dim light and trying to peer past Isaiah's shoulder, could see it was far better than "not half bad." Tryg's obvious skill put her own faulty scratched-out stories to shame. He had real talent; all she had was a small knack at stringing words together.

"We were going to picnic here," she said. "But we can find another place if you want peace to finish your work."

He began to gather up his materials. "Not at all. Let me get out of your way."

Gwen opened her mouth to invite him to say, then closed it. This was Isaiah's special day. No matter how much she would enjoy Tryg's company, she couldn't ask him to stay without Isaiah's permission.

"Join us," he surprised her by spontaneously offering. "Lynde packed enough food for an army. That is, if Gwen doesn't mind."

Gwen tried to keep her pleasure from showing _too_ plainly in her face, but she couldn't stop the smile that spread across her cheeks. "Of course not," she said. "I'd love it."

Tryg still hesitated, but with one final glance at Gwen's pink cheeks, he capitulated.

"I brought some bread and butter, and a couple apples," he said, making his own contribution to the spread.

Isaiah set the basket down on the rock with a grunt, and Gwen opened it up. She giggled.

"Trust Lynde! She even packed a cloth and silverware."

Isaiah shook his head. "Doesn't she know that a picnic is about roughing it?" He shouldered past Gwen and began taking food out of the basket, ostentatiously ignoring the cloth and utensils. "Sandwiches, crackers, cheese, olives, cookies—ooh, she even included half of a chocolate cake—carrots, cucumbers, raisins—"

"Did she leave any food in Ingleside?" Tryg demanded.

Gwen laughed.

Before long, there wasn't much left of the magnificent feast. Gwen ate her fair share, but she was amazed at how much the boys put away. Even Phil, who had the hearty appetite of most sixteen-year-old boys, didn't eat like these two. Tryg she could understand, as he worked hard on his uncle's farm, but Isaiah? If Isaac ate like him, and Chloe sometimes ate more than both together … well, Gwen didn't envy Aunt Rilla the amount of time she must spend in the kitchen.

"So how are you, Tryg?" Gwen asked as they finished the last crumbs of Lynde's chocolate cake.

He shrugged. "Well enough."

"How's the farm?" Isaiah asked, surprising Gwen again. She didn't think he knew Tryg well enough to know about the farm, or even care.

"Uncle's thinking about selling out, moving out west for Aunt's health."

"Really?" Isaiah said. His eyes kindled. "I've always wanted to go out west."

"Are you going, too?" Gwen asked, trying to hide her dismay. Somehow, even visiting Grandmother and Grandfather would lose some of its charm if Tryg weren't here any longer.

He shrugged again, this time looking uncomfortable. "I haven't decided. Uncle said it's up to me. Anja's going off to school—she won a full scholarship—for her music this autumn, so she's taken care of. Mother would go with Uncle and Aunt, and I have to make up my mind what I want." His smile was crooked. "It's harder than you might think."

"What do you have to think about?" Isaiah demanded. "Of course you want to go out west! Adventures all over the place out there! The pokey old east is nothing to it. I'm going out west someday."

"When?" Gwen asked, momentarily diverted.

Now it was Isaiah's turn to look uncomfortable. "Oh—just someday. But Tryg, why do you even have to think about it?"

Gwen let it drop—for now.

"Well, if go out there, I'll have to work at a ranch, since that's about all I know how to do. And to be perfectly honest, I hate working with animals. Working the land's not so bad, but cattle and sheep … not my interest."

"But horses!" Isaiah burst out, as though he couldn't keep still.

Tryg grinned again. "Sorry, I don't even really like horses."

"But what would you do here?" Isaiah said. "Wouldn't you just have to hire out as a farmhand somewhere here?"

"Well, I'd thought about going to college," Tryg admitted, sounding horribly embarrassed.

Gwen's eyes glowed, but Isaiah looked disgusted. "College. More school. When you could be working with horses on a ranch?"

"Oh Isaiah," Gwen said. "You don't understand. Tryg, would you go for your art?"

He nodded. "If I was accepted, and if I could work my way through. My schoolwork wasn't always the best in other areas. All I really know is how to draw."

"Yes, but the chance to pursue that …" Gwen swallowed. She wanted to ask him how he could even think of giving that up to go out west and do something he hated, but she held her tongue. It wasn't her place to push.

Besides, she herself still wasn't sure if she wanted to go on to college, even though she loved the idea of pursuing her writing. To insist that Tryg had to go would be as least slightly hypocritical.

"What about you?" he asked her now, turning the conversation as easily as Isaiah had. "What are your plans for the future?"

"Oh," Gwen said, blushing and stammering a little. She hated being the centre of attention, even when it was only two other people. "I'm not sure. Probably college."

"How is the—" Tryg checked himself with a glance at Isaiah. Gwen understood.

"It's all right," she said. "Isaiah knows about my writing. It's not much of a secret anymore. Lee found out, and then it trickled to everyone else. But I'd already told Isaiah."

"Ah. So how is it coming?"

"Nothing published," Gwen said with a frown. "I keep sending stories out, but they all come back. I know I'm not very good, but I don't seem to know how to improve. Mother says to just keep writing and eventually it will get better, but I think mine gets worse with time."

Tryg laughed. "Can't your teachers help?"

"No," Gwen said. "They have their hands full just trying to teach the class. They don't really have time for individual students."

"Well, what about a correspondence course? I did something like that one summer right after one of my teachers told me I really ought to do something with my art."

"I hadn't thought about that." Gwen pondered it for a moment, then favoured Tryg with her bright smile. "I'll have to give it a try! Even if it doesn't help, it can't possibly hurt."

"And what about college, are you thinking about that?"

Gwen hesitated. Thankfully Isaiah spared her the need to answer.

"I'm bored," he said, with his usual utter disregard for social niceties. "Gwen, you ready to go?"

"Do you want to come with us?" Gwen asked Tryg with an apologetic air. Really, Isaiah could be impossible sometimes.

He grinned. "Thanks, but I'd better get back to the farm. Until Uncle decides for certain to sell out, we've got to keep everything running smoothly. Thanks for lunch."

"Thanks for eating with us," Gwen said. "That much less for Isaiah to haul back."

Tryg's laugh rang in her ears as she exited the cave after her cousin and stepped out into the bright sun and cool rocks.

* * *

"West House

"Glen St. Mary, PEI

"July 23, 1938

"Dear Phil,

"How are you? How are the bugs and dirt and gases and … well, everything that you're studying? I was glad to get your last letter; it sounds as though everyone is treating you with respect even though you're 'just' a boy. And not just because of Uncle Carl, either! I knew that they would like and admire you just for you.

"This Miss Emerson sounds intriguing—is she really my age and there working with all the men? Of course, you said that her cousin, Miss Ward, was there as well. Miss Ward is older and established within the scientific world, correct? And Miss Emerson is there as her pupil, just as you are with Uncle Carl? You're not always terribly clear in your letters, you know, Phil!

"At any rate, I'm glad there's someone else there around your age for you to talk to (even though I know you can make friends with people of any age), and that you aren't the only young person along to learn.

"Of course, this is when Rachel or Patty or Aunt Ruth or even Lee would want to know if Miss Emerson is _pretty_ … but I know you don't care about that, or even notice! You said she's smart, and that's more important to you.

"Speaking of friends … do you remember Jack's friend Tryg Ahlberg? He was at the party Grandmother and Grandfather had, and Isaiah and I met him again yesterday when we were out exploring. He was drawing, as usual, and oh Phil, I wish so much I could be better at what I do. His work is breathtaking, really, and even though he works hard at it, so much of it comes naturally to him.

"There's you, who're so smart, and there's Jeremy, who has so much charm and potential, and there's Tryg who can create such beauty … even Lynde, she can cook better than anyone else on PEI. And Jack, who has such a bright future ahead of him.

"And then there's me. Even though I like to write, and I'm fairly good at it, and I'm a good runner, I still feel like I'm always trying to catch up with the rest of you, to hide the fact that I don't really belong. Not that any of you do anything to make me feel that way! But somehow the fact that you all believe there's something special about me makes me feel even more like a fraud.

"I think that's why I've been enjoying spending time with Ava and Hayden so much. They're wonderfully strong and confident, and yet there's no pride about them, and they don't seem to have any one particular talent that sets them apart from the rest of the world. When I'm with them, I feel it's all right to just be Gwen. I don't have to strive to be more.

"Goodness, this has turned gloomy! Here I meant to write to you all about Winnie's latest escapade, and the stray dog that Mary saved when Aunt Persis had given up hope and now won't leave her side, and all the other news. But I haven't time or paper now. I have to go get dinner started, or Uncle Bruce _will_ growl. Poor man, his hours are longer and longer with Uncle Jem gone, so I can't blame him for being frustrated when dinner is not on time.

"Work hard, learn much, and write soon! I miss you dreadfully.

"Love always,

"Gwen."


	10. Chapter 10

Gwen put the chicken for dinner in the oven and brushed her hands against her apron in satisfaction. The first time she had roasted a chicken, it came out horribly dry and tasteless. Everyone from Lynde to Mrs. Douglas had given her advice, but it wasn't until Lee—darling Lee—had sent her a recipe clipped out of _Good Housekeeping_ that she acquired the knack for keeping the bird juicy. Who would have thought putting a lemon and an onion in its cavities would make such a difference! And it was so much easier than stuffing.

One of the nicest things about coming to help Aunt Ruth was thinking about how much more use she was going to be around the house when she went home. Mother did her best, but housekeeping was not her strong suit; she much preferred either writing or visiting with Dad's parishioners.

Lee helped out some, but her head was usually in the clouds, and she was prone to make more work than she accomplished. Jo, surprisingly enough, was extremely knacky around the house, but he was becoming more and more involved in his music, and nobody ever wanted to take him away from that.

Some of the members of Dad's congregation thought it a disgrace that "the Reverend's family" wouldn't hire a girl to help out, but Gwen's parents preferred to save their pennies for their children's education.

"Never mind what people say," Dad always said cheerfully. A little worry line would then crease his forehead. "But I do hate making more work for you, Di."

"A little work never hurt anyone," Mother would reply, with that determined twinkle in her eyes. "My parents didn't raise me to be a fine lady, no matter what the people of the Glen think!"

Now, though, Gwen had much more of an idea of how to keep a house running smoothly, and she rejoiced to think how much she was going to be able to help Mum.

Unless, of course, she did go to college the year after this. She would only be around for summers then, unless of course she followed in family tradition and went to Redmond. She could live at home then.

She didn't really want to attend Redmond, though. Not only had her mother and most of her aunts and uncles graduated from Redmond, all her grandparents had gone there as well. Redmond had far too much family history; Gwen knew she would suffocate trying to live up to it. If she went to college at all, she wanted to go to a nice small school where no one had ever heard the names Shirley, Blythe, Gordon, or Blake.

Gwen realized she was still standing in the middle of the kitchen floor, staring blankly at the stove as she thought about all this, and hastily moved away. She untied the apron and hung it back on its hook, just as someone knocked on the open door.

She moved around the table to see who it was—Hayden was working this morning, and Isaiah was off doing something with his family—and her face split with a cautious smile.

"Why, Tryg! What brings you here this day?"

Tryg shuffled his feet with uncharacteristic hesitancy. "Hope I'm not interrupting anything."

"Not at all." Gwen stepped back from the doorway to let him enter. "I was just finishing up dinner preparation and about to have some lemonade. Would you like some?"

"Sure." Some of his customary ease returned to him as he stepped inside. "It's not too sweet, is it?"

Gwen grinned. "No. Uncle Bruce always adds a tablespoon or so of sugar to his, because he says I make it too sour."

"Lemonade's supposed to be tart," Tryg said seriously.

Gwen nodded. "I agree." She poured two glasses and set them on the table, seating herself in the chair closest to the hot stove.

Without any more preliminaries, Tryg sat down and set a flat parcel down on the table between them. "You don't have to keep this if you don't want it, but it's yours if you like."

Curious, Gwen undid the twine and peeled the brown paper back to reveal a beautifully simple sketch of the over-harbour shoreline—the piece Tryg had been working on the day she and Isaiah met him.

"Oh my," she said, looking at the soft black outlines, wondering how he had managed to capture so much emotion with a few pens and a sheet of white paper. "Tryg … it's beautiful. Are you sure you want to give it away?"

Now that the moment was over, Tryg was completely himself again. "Of course. I wouldn't have offered it if I didn't want you to have it. I thought, since you were there that day I was sketching it, that maybe you would like to have it."

Gwen didn't know much about art, but she knew that this would fetch a fair price in any gallery. She was honoured beyond words that Tryg would just give it to her, just because he thought she might like it.

"I'll hang it next to the Viking ship, and it will be inspiration for me," she said.

Tryg laughed suddenly. "That old thing? You still have it?"

"Of course! Some of my best stories have come after looking at that for a while."

"Well, I'm glad it can be of some use, then. How are the stories, by the way? Any improvement since our last talk?"

"No," Gwen said with a rueful smile. "Maybe this new picture will help. Most days I just feel like an impostor, like I'm just playing at being a writer. I don't have half the talent you have."

"I've been drawing since I was a shaver," Tryg said seriously. "You've only been writing stories for a couple of years. Give yourself some time." He paused, traced a finger down through the condensation on his glass. "If you like …"

"What?"

"Well, since you say you like looking at pictures to help inspire you, I thought maybe I could drop off one of my sketchbooks here some day, leave it for you to look over, see if anything strikes a chord. It's not as good as real art, but if it might help …?"

Once again, Gwen was overwhelmed at his generosity. "Tryg, that is so kind of you. I would love to look at your sketchbook, even if it didn't do anything to help me."

"Maybe just seeing some of my really terrible pieces will help you feel better about your stories," Tryg grinned.

Gwen laughed. "I doubt that. You know what would be fun, though?"

"What's that?"

"If we could collaborate on a project—I write the story, and you draw the illustrations. At least, I think it'd be fun, but you probably wouldn't want to." Gwen felt suddenly abashed, as though she'd overstepped her bounds. Tryg, however, looked interested.

"I've never tried illustration. How would we do it, do you suppose? Would you write I and then let me draw, or would I draw something and then you form a story around it? Or would we come up with something together and then each do our part?"

"I like that third way the best, I think. That is, if you really want to do it."

"Of course! I think it's a brilliant idea."

Tryg looked so pleased that Gwen felt bashful. Who would have thought she could come with an idea that would make someone else so happy?

"When do you want to start work?" she asked.

Tryg immediately pulled a small sketchpad out of his pocket. "How about right now?"

Gwen couldn't restrain a small laugh. "Let me go get my notebook and pencil."

* * *

Two hours and several torn pages on the floor later, the collaborators had a working outline of a plot. It was, unsurprisingly enough, about a young fisherman in the Maritimes. Gwen, whose taste ran more toward the Gothic, had wanted it to be a dark and melancholy ghost story, where the fisherman was haunted by the spirit of his former love, eventually pushing him to drown himself so they could be reunited.

Tryg was a bit more practical, and had wanted a story that read more like a how-to manual of a successful fisherman's daily routine.

It was a good thing that Gwen was naturally diffident and Tryg good-natured, or their partnership might have been of short duration. Eventually, though, Gwen managed to convince Tryg that a good story needed _some_ conflict (not to mention plot), and he persuaded her that ghosts really were impossible for him to draw.

And so it became a humorous tale of a young fellow who thought he was haunted by the ghost of the prize fish he had caught the previous year, and all the foolish tricks he tried to get rid of it, before he met a girl who agreed to help him exorcise it, and proceeded to perform a number of practical tasks that took care of the "haunting" - fixing the loose shingles on the roof that shook and rattled at night, replacing the warped board in his boat that let in the water which made him think the fish was trying to drown him, etc. In the end, the fisherman felt exceedingly foolish, but he learned his lesson and married the girl, so all ended well.

Gwen was sorry to give up her romantic ghost, but had to admit that this would make a more entertaining story to read. And when she saw the rough sketch Tryg drew of Max, their fisherman, she had to admit it was perfect. His ears stuck out just a little, his nose was a bit too long, his hands too big for his body, and he looked all-around awkward and amiable.

"But what about the girl?" she asked.

"She should be beautiful," Tryg said decisively, but Gwen shook her head.

"Too beautiful and nobody will like her with Max. I think she should be pretty, but in a practical, no-nonsense way. You know, like say … Mary Crawford as opposed to Aunt Persis."

"I suppose," Tryg surrendered. "What about her name?"

Gwen tapped her pencil against her lower lip. "It should be something that goes well with Max, but not too similar. Something that starts with 'M,' but has more syllables …"

"Maggie?"

Gwen considered this, then shook her head. "It sounds too close to Max. Hmm … I know! Molly. Max and Molly."

"Perfect," Tryg agreed. "And you're right, a Molly shouldn't be too beautiful. No classic Greek outlines."

"Definitely not."

They grinned at each other.

"So I'll put together a few sketches, and you can start a rough draft of the story, and we'll meet when to start putting them together?"

"Next week?" Gwen asked. "Or is that too soon? I have no idea how long it will take you to draw it all."

"Next week will be fine. A week from today, then?"

Gwen nodded agreement, and they clinked their empty lemonade glasses together.

"Here's to a successful partnership," Tryg said, and Gwen felt a pleased tingle in her stomach.

After Tryg left, Gwen still stood absently in the kitchen for a while, smelling the roasting chicken without really being aware of it, thinking about this new project.

Maybe part of her problem with her writing was her tendency toward melodrama. Already she could envision how this story was going to take shape … with words strong and simple, with humour underlying everything. With her gothic tales, she tended toward big words and lengthy sentences. Her heroines were always pale and beautiful; her heroes dark and melancholy (and often dead).

Maybe she should try more realism. Not quite the sweet, simple children's tales that Grandmother loved so well. Those were lovely, but too close to the insipid fairy tales Gwen had started out writing for her to feel comfortable following that path.

But perhaps stories of real people, with real problems and real solutions, was the way to go. Some people could do melodrama well, but Gwen had an uncomfortable suspicion that she was not a Brontë.

It didn't always have to be plain, comic stories, either. Surely the tale of Grandmother and Grandfather Blake was as romantic as any Gwen had ever read in a storybook! Grandmother, the belle of Bolingbroke, with dozens of beaus falling at her feet, determined to marry for wealth and appearance and never fall in love, only to meet a poor seminary student who was determined to preach in the slums, and was terribly ugly to boot, fall head-over-heels in love, and marry him despite her family's disapproval.

Or even Grandmother and Grandfather Blythe - the way that Grandmother spurned Grandfather for years, and only realized when he was dying that she truly loved him.

Aunt Rilla and Uncle Ken … to fall in love only to be separated by war. Aunt Persis and Uncle Shirley, the flamboyant beauty marrying the quiet recluse, giving up a life of excitement and glamour to become a village veterinarian.

Why, Gwen thought, she was _surrounded_ by romance and stories, only she'd never paid the slightest bit of attention to it! How could she have missed it for so long?

And it wasn't just romance, either. She remembered Grandfather telling her about Joy, the aunt who had only lived one day. Gwen still could sometimes _see_ Joy in Rainbow Valley, though she'd never been there, having lived and died at the House of Dreams. There was tragedy and hope for one.

Uncle Jem and Aunt Faith, finding hope and joy after Uncle Walter's death in the birth of their John Walter, the brilliant hope of the next generation.

Chloe, creating mischief and mayhem wherever she went, simply for the sake of a bit of drama. Poor Fanny, unsure of what she wanted from life and sinking deeper into misery for it. Noble Aunt Una, dedicating her life to helping others after the War. Brave Mary Crawford, chasing a dream to be more than a poor fisherman's daughter.

Gwen's awestruck revelation was interrupted by a change in the smell coming from the oven. She blinked.

"My chicken!" she shrieked to the air, and rushed to pull it out.

It was a little browner than she had hoped, but still good. She breathed a sigh of relief, and then started to laugh.

That was everyday life for one—revelations and cooking mishaps all jumbled together. Why had she wasted so much time on silly ghosts and doomed lovers?

Reality was _far_ more interesting and entertaining!


	11. Chapter 11

"West House

"Glen St. Mary, PEI

"July 31, 1938

"Dear Grandmother,

"How has your July been? Jeremy wrote last week and said he'd been spending a lot of time at Mount Holly with you. I can only imagine the trouble you are getting into! You and Jeremy together are very dangerous.

"I wish I could be there with you, keeping you two from doing anything too dreadful, but I have been having a marvellous time here in Glen St. Mary. I'm sure you've heard all about Hayden and Ava (if Jeremy hasn't told you, Lee will have during her visits, I know). Not only am I having all sorts of fun with them, I've also started a collaboration with my friend Tryg, who is an amazingly talented artist. I'm writing the story, and he's doing the illustrations, and when we've finished we're going to send it out to all the big magazines and see if we can get it published. I'm sure we won't, but it is fun to pretend that we might! Someday, I know, Tryg will be famous, and oh, how proud I shall be to be able to say that once I worked on a project with him.

"Isaiah Ford and I have been exploring, as usual, and even though we know the countryside around here inside and out, there's always the possibility that we might discover something new.

"When I'm not working with Tryg, exploring with Isaiah, or out with Hayden and Ava, I've been learning what tremendously hard work it is to run a household. I don't have to do much with the twins, and thank goodness, because I don't think I could possibly take care of the responsibilities of maintaining a home _and_ raise children. I'm afraid I'm a dismal prospect for any man as a wife! Unless he were rich enough to afford a housekeeper and a nanny, of course.

"I see your eyes twinkling, and hear you asking in that too-innocent voice of yours, 'Isn't Hayden Wentworth rich enough to afford those things?' Yes he is, but truly, Grandmother, whatever Jeremy and Lee have told you, Hay and I are not serious about each other. We do go out quite often—we had the most fun dinner the other evening, at a new restaurant in Maywood—but he has to marry to please his family as well as himself, and I, if I do ever marry, want someone more like Phil than Hayden. Not that I want to marry my brother! But I'd like to marry someone a bit more quiet, who actually can be serious once in a while, who is always considerate of other people.

"I laugh more around Hay than I do around anyone else, but I rarely do anything but laugh, and you know, Grandmother, that a person has to have some balance. Life can't _always_ be a big joke, though it might be nice if it was. No, I don't think it would, either! I love to laugh, but I also love sometimes to just be still and calm, or to be solemn even. I don't think Hay even takes God very seriously, and I could just never be happy living like that.

"Besides, I don't fit into his world, either. As good of a time as we had at the restaurant, I could just tell, from the way he ordered the meal and how comfortable he felt there, that this was nothing new to him. I, on the other hand, have only eaten at a nice restaurant once or twice, and never alone with a young man! He didn't say or do anything to make me feel uncomfortable or embarrassed about it, but I know that if we were to be a real couple, and especially if we ever got married, I'd make social gaffe after social gaffe. There is something to be said, after all, for marrying within ones own class. Or, if you do marry outside it, marry someone with enough poise to adapt easily.

"I, alas, have no poise of any sort!"

Gwen dashed off a few more paragraphs and then signed the letter. As she waited for the ink to dry, she thought back to the dinner. What she hadn't told Grandmother Blake (because, no matter how much she might seem like an older girl chum, there were certain things one just never told a grandmother) was that afterward, as Hayden walked her back to the house, he had kissed her.

Taken completely by surprise, Gwen had moved her head away, so that his lips touched her cheek instead of her mouth, but it was still a kiss. She stood gaping at him in shock, wondering if she was supposed to slap him, scream, or apologize for moving. He just grinned, which didn't help anything.

"What was that for?" she finally demanded weakly.

Hay shrugged. "It seemed a good idea at the time. Beautiful girl, moonlit night, personable young man … everything seemed to point to the propitious time for a kiss."

"But I don't kiss young men, no matter how personable," Gwen said, feeling something halfway between ashamed and elated.

Hay's grin deepened, making his dimples pop out. "Yes, I gathered that when you ducked."

Gwen had not been able to keep from giggling at that, and Hayden then bid her goodnight quite easily, and they had parted on the same amicable terms on which they had begun the evening.

Still, Gwen hadn't quite been able to shake the oddness of the episode. She had been raised with the idea that only _fast_ girls kissed boys before they were engaged or at least seriously walking out. Yet Hayden had seemed so matter-of-fact about it, and he certainly wasn't a _rake_. Now Gwen wondered if she was just hopelessly provincial, and if kissing really wasn't such a big deal.

On the other hand, it seemed instinctively wrong to let Hay kiss her when she felt nothing—or nothing much—for him beyond friendship. It felt … deceitful, almost, like she was promising something she wasn't intending to give.

And on top of all that, she felt a half-guilty regret that she had moved away from his kiss. It would have been interesting to know what it did feel like to kiss, or be kissed by, a boy.

It was so dreadfully complicated to be a girl.

The ink dry, Gwen folded up her letter and put it in the envelope. As she scribbled the address, she thought fondly of her sweet, merry grandmother, who really did seem like a girl still despite her white hair and wrinkles. Grandmother Blythe was sweet and kind, too, but she was very much a _grandmother_. Gwen would never talk to her about the kind of man she wanted to marry, though she would go to her on advice regarding friendships in a heartbeat.

Yet her grandmothers had been college chums, and were very nearly the same age. Gwen spared a few moments wondering what she and Lynde would be like when they were old … if Lynde would be the sage, wise grandmother, and if she, Gwen, would still be clumsy and awkward, or if she would have gained some poise over the years!

Thinking of herself with grey hair and wrinkled hands made Gwen giggle, and she was still laughing as she went outside to post her letter.

Chloe was waiting for her at the gate. Gwen's smile died on her lips. "What do you want?" she asked, not caring if she sounded rude. Chloe had that challenging look on her face, so Gwen knew she wasn't there for any good reason.

"I wanted to talk to you away from everyone else," Chloe said. She jutted her chin out. "Unless you're _scared_ to talk to me."

As usual, her cousin's dramatics only made Gwen feel a mixture of amusement and exasperation. "Why on earth would I be afraid to talk to you?"

"Because I know what you're really like, and if you don't listen to me, I'll start telling people."

Gwen's amusement vanished in a flash. "Tell people? You mean how you told everyone I was sent away from home in disgrace two years ago?"

Chloe didn't look the least bit discomposed at the reminder of her lie. "That may not have been true, but at least it served to show everyone that you weren't as _sweet_ and _perfect_ as you made out."

Gwen, who had never thought of herself as anything remotely close to perfect (or sweet, really—that was Lee), resisted the urge to roll her eyes. "Well, what do you want now?"

"I want you to leave my brother alone."

"What?" This was beyond ridiculous.

Chloe's hands were on her hips, and her eyes flashed. "Mummy is worried about Isaiah, because he doesn't want to finish school. He just wants to go have _adventures_ somewhere. He thinks school's a waste of time. And if _he_ quits, then Isaac will too. And then _I'll_ be branded as the girl whose brothers dropped out!"

It figured, Gwen thought in disgust, that Chloe would be more worried about her reputation than her brothers' education. "Your mother told you this?" Chloe was not whom Gwen would have chosen for a confidant, were she a mother.

Chloe rolled _her_ eyes. "Of _course_ not. She told Daddy, and I overheard."

"Well, what does this have to do with me, anyway? I'm certainly not going to tell Isaiah he should quit school." Not that he would listen to her, anyway. They may have been friends, but Isaiah emphatically made up his own mind.

Chloe sniffed. "_Maybe_, but if he keeps seeing how _lazy_ you are, and how you're only interested in catching a rich husband instead of _making_ something of your own life, he'll start to think even more that he doesn't need school. _I_ don't know why you're such an influence on him, but if you care about him _at all_, you'll see that I'm right."

Gwen wondered how somebody could look complacent and spiteful all at the same time. She also realized that she ought to be offended by Chloe's characterization of her, but somehow couldn't find it worthwhile. She and Chloe would never be friends, and in the end, it really didn't matter what the younger girl thought of her.

In a flash of unexpected insight, she wondered if some of Chloe's current spite was simply that Gwen had a relationship with Isaiah that Chloe had never had, and likely never would.

It wasn't really possible to feel pity for Chloe, but Gwen thought she could at least answer civilly.

"Chloe, I am not going to just start ignoring Isaiah. He is my _friend_ as well as my cousin. But I can promise you that I will do everything in my power to encourage him to finish school."

Chloe looked taken aback. Apparently she had expected a very different response. "Well, good," she finally said flatly. She turned to leave, but twisted her head around to deliver one final blow. "And _could_ you stop carrying on in public with your _boyfriend_ the way you have been? You may be _really_ a Blake, but everyone knows you're connected to the Blythes, and you're making the rest of us _look bad_."

Gwen opened her mouth to say … she wasn't sure what, either that Hayden wasn't her boyfriend, or she wasn't carrying on, or that she was as much a Blythe as Chloe, or even that Chloe needed to start minding her own business … but thankfully she caught sight of Tryg down the road and closed her mouth without saying anything but,

"Goodbye, Chloe," and hurrying past her dumbfounded cousin to meet her friend.

Tryg grinned as she approached. "What was that all about?"

Gwen raised one shoulder. "With Chloe, who knows?"

Tryg held out a sheaf of papers. "I finished the final illustrations."

Gwen clapped her hands. "Oh, marvellous!" She took the packet. The next part, by agreement, was hers. She was going to borrow Grandfather's typewriter and put the story into its final form, and then she was going to start sending it to magazines. Grandmother, who had found out about and was keenly interested in the project, had already started compiling a list of publications for them.

"Do you suppose we could actually get published?" Gwen asked.

It was Tryg's turn to shrug. "Who knows? Even if we don't, it's been grand to work on this."

"It certainly has," Gwen said. The more time she spent with Tryg, the more she appreciated his quiet strength and gentle humour. He was just a rough farmer, yet somehow he made Oliver look callow and Hayden immature.

Gwen sighed inwardly. She supposed Tryg's ideal woman would be calm, graceful, elegant, and quiet … everything Gwen was not.

Not that she had romantic feelings for Tryg. Not at all! It somehow seemed … presumptuous … to think of him as one did other boys. She was just glad to have him as a friend, and she only wished she could live up more to his ideal.

Tryg made her want to be a better person.

* * *

As Tryg walked back to his uncle's, his mouth was twisted in a wry grin. He had been so badly tempted to procrastinate on those illustrations, to put off finishing them, just so he would keep having excuses to see Gwen.

His artistic integrity wouldn't allow that, though, and now he supposed he wouldn't see her again unless, by some long stretch of the imagination, their story actually was published.

He couldn't regret handing the final project over to her, though. The delight on her expressive face was enough to make him glad to have done the deed.

Tryg's smile suddenly turned to a scowl, and he kicked a stone in the road, sending up a cloud of dust.

"Wentworth better appreciate what a jewel he has," he muttered, and coughed.

Tryg knew he could never deserve Gwen, but by Thor (Tryg's immersion in Norse mythology had given him a tendency to invoke the lesser-known gods, rather than Jove or the like), he would see her with someone who did!


	12. Chapter 12

"Gwen, you aren't really thinking about going to college, are you?"

Isaiah's question took Gwen slightly by surprise. The two cousins hadn't been talking about much of anything in particular, just lazily lying in the grass watching the clouds drift by and eating cookies. Gwen was due for another driving lesson with Uncle Bruce (he had even stopped trying to grab the wheel from her every few moments, so she guessed she was improving) soon, but for right now, everything was placid. Gwen liked to look for pictures in the clouds, but Isaiah thought that was the dumbest thing he'd ever heard of, so she restrained herself.

"What makes you ask that?" she said, propping herself up on one elbow and looking at the dark-haired boy beside her.

"You've never talked about it, but Grandfather was asking you the other evening if you were going to run in college, and you just shrugged. _Are_ you thinking about it?"

Gwen wanted to shrug again, but she remembered her conversation with Chloe from a week ago, and answered honestly.

"I'm not sure. I mean, yes, I'm thinking about it, but I'm just not sure I want to go."

Isaiah snorted deep in his chest. "College is a waste of time. School in general is a waste of time. Who needs all this dumb stuff like algebra and poetry? Why can't we just be out there _living_? I thought you, at least, had enough sense to see that."

Gwen had to confess that, for someone like Isaiah, he probably would learn more from "just living" than he ever would in school. Still,

"You have to graduate from high school, at least, Isaiah."

"Why?"

Gwen floundered. "Well … because."

He laughed at her. "See? Even you can't think of a good reason?"

"You should always finish what you start," Gwen said, falling back on one of Grandfather's favourite truisms.

"Is that the best you can do?"

"It's a good reason, young Isaiah," Uncle Bruce said, his deep voice startling both of them. "Besides, even if you don't want to go on to college, a high school diploma is a useful sort of thing. It makes an impression, you know, on other people, and it can help you get places you want to go."

Isaiah sat up and spun in place to face Uncle Bruce. For a wonder, he didn't seem angry, just challenging. "I want to work on a horse ranch out west. Maybe even travel to the States, work on some of the ranches out there. What good will a high school diploma do me there?"

Uncle Bruce shrugged. "Maybe nothing," he said, making Gwen gasp. "But just maybe, you'll do well enough that in time you'll own a horse or two yourself. And then maybe buy yourself a bit of land, start breeding your horses. Maybe eventually you'll work your way up to be a successful businessman. And having a high school diploma, having the book-learning you so despise now, might just make your way a little bit smoother."

"Maybe," Isaiah conceded. The glow in his eyes proved that Uncle Bruce's possible future had struck a chord with him. Gwen thought fast.

"Isaiah," she said. "I'll make a deal with you. Uncle Jeremiah has a business contact over in the States—California, I think it is, or maybe Colorado. He has a ranch with both horses and cattle. If you agree to finish high school, get your diploma, I'll ask Uncle Jeremiah to recommend you for a position with him."

"Really?" Isaiah looked skeptical. "And how do you know about your uncle's business contact?"

Gwen laughed. "Because my cousin Rachel is even more horse-mad than you are. She's been pestering Uncle Jeremiah for her last three birthdays to take her out to Mr. Bendow's ranch for her present." She turned serious. "I wouldn't lie to you, Isaiah."

"No," he conceded. "I suppose you wouldn't." He fell silent, pondering the matter. Gwen and Uncle Bruce were also quiet, waiting for his decision. Gwen glanced at her uncle in time to intercept a wink from him. She smiled back, holding in a giggle.

"All right," Isaiah finally said. He held out his hand to Gwen. "I'll finish high school, and you'll talk to your uncle for me. Deal."

"Deal," Gwen replied, pleased. They shook hands.

"And I stand as witness to the deal," Uncle Bruce announced. "Shall we seal the matter with more of Lynde's excellent cookies?"

"Those are my cookies," Gwen informed him smugly.

He blinked. "Great Scott. It's a good thing for Lynde you're going home this fall, my dear, or she would be in grave danger of losing her reputation as the Island's finest cookie-maker."

Gwen couldn't quite believe him, but it was nice to hear.

"By the way, Isaiah," Uncle Bruce said suddenly. "I'd like to add a little something of my own to this deal. If you graduate at the top of your class, I'll buy you a horse of your own once you have a place to keep it."

Isaiah narrowed his eyes. "Will I get to choose the horse?"

Uncle Bruce barely smiled. "Not to worry, lad, I won't inflict a broken-down old nag on you. The horse shall be your choice."

Isaiah sighed heavily. "There are some awfully smart people in my class … but all right. For a horse of my own, I'll finish at the top. Just see if I don't!"

Now it was the men's turn to shake hands, with Gwen acting as witness for their deal. They polished off the platter of cookies, and then Isaiah left for the House of Dreams, gloomily concluding that if he wanted to be head of his class when he graduated, he'd better start working on improving his grades now.

Uncle Bruce and Gwen smiled secretly at each other after he left.

"How did _you_ know Isaiah was struggling in school, Gwen?"

"Chloe told me. How did you know?"

"Ken told me. I think we've done a good work today."

"I hope Aunt Rilla won't be upset that we didn't try to persuade him to go to college," Gwen said, biting her lower lip.

Uncle Bruce shook his head. "I should think she'd be happy that we simply convinced him to stay in high school. Besides, as much as it may seem like heresy to say so in the Blythe family—or even the Merediths, come to that—higher education really isn't for everyone. Look at Isaiah. He'd be utterly wasted in a classroom. He's right—he will learn far more working in the great outdoors than he ever could from books. For most, a combination of books and experience are the best teachers. For others, they stay locked in their world of books always. And for some, experience beats out the books, every time."

"Which kind am I?" Gwen wondered uneasily.

Uncle Bruce laughed and ruffled her hair as though she were no older than Winnie and Ruthie. "You'll find out for yourself, in time. Don't fret about it now." Winking, he added, "You wouldn't want frown lines to mar that pretty forehead! What would Hayden Wentworth say?"

Gwen rolled her eyes. "I don't give two pins what Hay would say, and I don't believe he cares a bit about my forehead."

Uncle Bruce raised his eyebrows skeptically, putting lines in his own forehead. "Oh _really_? Are you just toying with the lad, then? Trying to make poor Oliver Grant jealous? Oh Gwen, don't tell me you're going to be a heartbreaker!"

Gwen rose with dignity. "One thing I am not going to do, and that is listen to any more of this nonsense. Hay and I are friends, Uncle Bruce, and so are Oliver and I, and that is the end of it! And if _that's_ going to be the sort of thing you're going to say to me, then I think we can just _skip_ the driving lesson today." She went inside, carrying the empty cookie plate, and silently fumed as her uncle's deep chuckles followed her to the door.

* * *

It was a day or two after her deal with Isaiah that Gwen, stepping out to enjoy a breath of the late roses, was confronted by Aunt Rilla.

Chloe took after the Fords in appearance, mostly (aside from her dented chin and hazel eyes), but at that moment, Gwen thought Aunt Rilla looked just like Chloe in a fury.

"Gwen!" she said, and her usually smooth voice bordered on shrill. "How could you tell my son that you would try to get him a job in California?"

Gwen blinked. The attack was so unexpected it left her stammering. "Why—I—I—"

Aunt Rilla sniffed dramatically. "When his father and I have been working so hard to encourage him to stay in school, to _make_ something of his life …! He has a brilliant mind, he could do anything, anything at all! And then all our hard work to be overthrown by a mere girl, an ungrateful niece who plots with him behind my back to ship him off halfway across the world!"

Indignation overcame Gwen's confusion. "But I only told him that so he'd stay in school, Aunt Rilla! He wanted to quit high school to work with horses. Wouldn't you rather have him stay in school until graduation, at least?"

"Isaiah would never quit high school," Aunt Rilla snapped. "He wouldn't do that to his family."

Gwen longed to snap back that yes, he would, but some small amount of common sense left made her hold her tongue. Likely Chloe had tattled on their deal to Aunt Rilla, twisting the details as usual, and gotten Aunt Rilla all worked up. Anything Gwen said now would just make things worse.

Hopefully Aunt Rilla would go talk to Grandmother after this, and Grandmother would calm her down. Aunt Rilla wasn't _so_ bad, really, when she wasn't upset. It just seemed that she got upset quite easily, especially when Gwen or her siblings were involved. All part of that silly fuss between her and Mother after Uncle Walter had died, Gwen supposed.

"I'm very sorry," she said placatingly. "I honestly thought I was doing a good thing."

Perhaps her penitence softened Aunt Rilla's wrath. Perhaps surprise at Gwen not arguing just took the wind out of her sails. Whatever it was, Aunt Rilla blinked, coughed, sniffed once more, and subsided.

"Well," she said grumpily. "Maybe you didn't mean harm. But really, Gwen, you're not a child anymore! You're seventeen years old, practically a woman! By the time your mother, Aunt Nan, and I were seventeen we were all nearly adults. You need to learn to think before you speak and act, and not just jump right into things."

Gwen swallowed something. "Yes, Aunt Rilla," she said, and nobody would ever know what it cost her to speak so meekly.

Aunt Rilla sailed on her way, and Gwen went back inside, seething.

"I was _trying_ to do a good thing," she muttered as she clashed her pots and pans in the kitchen.

"She ought to be grateful to me!" as she violently stirred up dust with her broom in the entryway.

"I do think before I speak, _lots_ of times," as she whisked her dustcloth over the mantelpiece so hard two of the china ornaments fell off … thankfully landing unharmed in the ashes of the fireplace.

Gwen picked them up guiltily. She was too impetuous, she knew, still, but she wasn't as bad as Aunt Rilla seemed to think. "Besides, even Uncle Bruce thought we were doing a good thing!" She wished her uncle had been there when Aunt Rilla came by—he could have told her how it happened.

Although if Uncle Bruce had been around, Aunt Rilla probably wouldn't have said anything in the first place. Gwen was quite certain that Chloe wouldn't have mentioned their uncle's involvement in the deal to her mother!

She finished cleaning the house without any more accidents or muttered asides, but her heart was still sore when she was finished with the work that evening, and Uncle Bruce was home, supper eaten, and the twins ready for bed.

"Uncle Bruce," she said, shifting restlessly from foot to foot. "Do you mind terribly if I go for a run?"

"Now?" he asked, glancing at the dimming sky.

"I'll be careful," Gwen promised. "I just need to get out."

"You do look rather like you're about to jump out of your skin. Boy troubles?"

"No," Gwen said, trying not to sound snappish.

Her wretched uncle just grinned. "That's what they all say. Take your run, Gwen. Just watch your feet. The roads can get tricky when you can't see as well."

"I promise," Gwen said, and bolted off to get changed.

* * *

Out on the road, pace steadily increasing as she went, Gwen started to feel better. As always, the running cleared her thoughts and calmed her spirit. After all, what did it matter if Aunt Rilla was upset? What mattered was that Isaiah was going to stay in school. Yes, it would have been nice to get praise for her role in it, but she knew, and Uncle Bruce knew, how it really happened, and that was enough.

As for not being as mature as her aunts and mother by age seventeen … well, maybe that was true. Mother and Aunt Nan were finished at Queen's and teaching school themselves preparatory to going on to Redmond when they were seventeen. Aunt Rilla had turned seventeen during the war.

Gwen frowned and her steps faltered momentarily. _Was_ she immature? She certainly didn't appear so compared with most of her peers … the silly girls back home, giggling and preening over Phil, spending all their time fussing over makeup and hair. Poor Fanny here, wasting her time with Van because she couldn't have Jack.

Even Ava and Hayden seemed content just to drift for a few more years before taking up their mantle of adult responsibility. Why, that was the whole meaning behind her relationship with Hay, that they were both relishing the freedom of this unique time in their lives, that brief stage between childhood and adulthood.

Gwen's frown smoothed out and her steps fell back into a smooth rhythm. No, she decided, if she wasn't quite at the stage of her aunts and mother, she wasn't immature, either. The world had just shifted a little since the war, that was all.

And, if she was perfectly honest, Aunt Rilla's charge to think before she spoke or acted wasn't entirely unjustified. Despite her seventeen years, Gwen was still too prone to blurting things out impulsively, and only realizing how they might sound after it was too late.

A truly mature person would discard her aunt's stings and take the good advice to heart. Gwen wasn't sure she was that mature, but she could at least promise herself to work hard so that the _next_ time Aunt Rilla made that claim, it wouldn't be justified at all.

By now the sun was nearly down all the way, and knowing that Uncle Bruce would be worried, Gwen turned her steps back toward West House. Running, as always, had done its job, and she felt refreshed and renewed, and only a teensy bit annoyed with her aunt and Chloe.

It was enough.


	13. Chapter 13

Sometimes, Gwen almost forgot _why_ she was in the Glen. Yes, Aunt Ruth was confined to her bed, but really, she seemed so bright and cheerful that it was hard to remember that Uncle Bruce was concerned about her health and the baby's. She still ran the household, even from the spare bedroom. Every morning Gwen received what she mischievously called her "marching orders." Aunt Ruth administered whatever discipline or comfort and encouragement the twins needed, and everything seemed to be proceeding swimmingly.

Except—sometimes—a little frown shadowed Uncle Bruce's forehead when he finished checking on her each morning and evening, and as July gave way to August and Aunt Ruth's time to deliver grew closer, he began making noises about sending her to the hospital in Lowbridge to have the baby.

"Nonsense," Aunt Ruth said. Gwen wasn't _trying_ to overhear, but she and Lynde were on the porch chatting over lemonade, and Aunt Ruth's window was open, and neither she nor Uncle Bruce made any attempt to lower their voices. "I've stayed here in this bed for the last several months—"

"Weeks, woman! Must you females exaggerate everything?"

"—because of your silly ideas, but I am not going to have my baby in a hospital. Being in a cold, empty place like that, with a lot of nurses bossing me to death, would be far worse for me than staying here until the baby decides to come."

"I am not just your paranoid husband, you silly woman, I'm your doctor! Don't you think I know what's best for you?"

"Don't you think that women know better than any man, even a most learned doctor, what's best for them in giving birth?"

Uncle Bruce growled incoherently, and Gwen and Lynde had to bury their faces in their arms to stifle their giggles. Aunt Ruth was a plump, placid woman, and Uncle Bruce a fierce, imposing man, but anyone could tell that she ruled the roost there at West House.

After Uncle Bruce stormed out and grumbled all the way down the hill to his office in the village, Lynde looked at Gwen with concern and guilt mingling in her face.

"Should we have laughed at that? If Dr. Bruce is so concerned, maybe Mrs. Ruth really should go to the hospital."

Gwen stretched lazily. "Nothing against Uncle Bruce, but if Aunt Ruth says she's fit to have her baby here at home, I'll back her against the finest doctor in the world."

* * *

It served her right, Gwen thought miserably a week later, for making such a blithe statement. That very night after getting into the argument with Uncle Bruce, Aunt Ruth had complained of a slight fever. She wouldn't allow Gwen to tell Uncle Bruce about it, though, and hid it remarkably well from Bruce when he checked on her. He was busy with an alarming outbreak of measles in Lowbridge, and she refused to trouble him with her little problem.

"I'll be just fine," she insisted when Gwen tried to argue with her. "It's just a little cold, and I'll only feel worse if I know your uncle is fretting over me. It'll pass in a few days, don't worry."

It didn't pass, though, and by the time Gwen was sufficiently alarmed to defy her aunt's prohibition, it was too late for Uncle Bruce to move her without endangering her health—and the baby's—even more.

"D—d stubborn woman," he growled. "Beg pardon, Gwen."

Gwen rather felt like swearing herself—though not at Aunt Ruth. She was supposed to be there to _help_. Why hadn't she seen that Aunt Ruth was sicker than she admitted? She should have spoken sooner. If Aunt Ruth lost the baby now, so close to its time to be born … if anything should happen to Aunt Ruth herself … well, Gwen would never forgive herself, never.

"I don't blame you, Gwennie," Uncle Bruce said gently, and the childhood nickname nearly sent Gwen into tears. "Your aunt is a determined lady, and you're not a trained nurse. There's no way you should have recognized how serious this was."

"But I was supposed to help!" Gwen tried not to wail.

He half-grinned. "And so you will. With this epidemic of measles in Lowbridge, I can't get a trained nurse to come stay for love nor money. I'm sending the twins to stay with Mother and Father, and you and I together are going to bring your aunt and the baby through this." He looked at her keenly from underneath his bushy brows. "Are you up for it?"

Gwen wasn't at all sure that she was, but under that piercing gaze she straightened her shoulders and raised her chin. "I'll do my best."

"Good girl," he said, and his tone was approving rather than patronizing. Then he sighed. "We've a long haul in front of us, Gwennie."

"Just tell me what to do," Gwen said.

* * *

And so began a long—or what seemed like a long—period of time which always remained hazy in Gwen's memory in later years. She remembered Uncle Bruce barking out incomprehensible orders, and following them to the best of her ability. She remembered crying herself to sleep most nights, and then hating herself for being so weak as to give in to tears. She remembered washing countless instruments that looked terribly frightening to her untrained eyes, but that Uncle Bruce seemed to find most comforting.

Grandfather Blythe was there most days, conferring with Uncle Bruce. He had stepped in to fill in at the main practice and yet _still_ found time to stop by and check on Aunt Ruth. Gwen suspected he rather enjoyed coming out of retirement, though naturally he would have preferred for there to be no crisis that took Uncle Bruce out of commission.

And along with everything else he was doing, Grandfather always made sure to pat Gwen's shoulder and whisper encouraging words to her. Some days she didn't think she would make it through were it not for Grandfather's belief in her. He had always had faith in her abilities—he had been the first to cheer her on with her running, and had always made her feel that he would encourage her in whatever path she chose for her life. Gwen was deeply thankful for his presence during this trial.

Hayden and Ava were invaluable, too, showing the true worth of their friendship. Hayden ran any and every errand Gwen and Uncle Bruce asked of him, no matter how far it took him or how onerous it was. Ava stopped by every day with food and coffee from the café, and she forced Uncle Bruce to eat, which was more than Gwen could do.

"You won't be any use to Mrs. Ruth if you fall ill yourself from lack of food," she said practically, and hovered over him until he reluctantly ate his meals.

Of Tryg, Gwen saw nothing, which surprised her a little. She thought that he would have stopped by at least to see how they were doing. She tried to reassure herself that maybe he just hadn't heard, but knowing how quickly information spread in that community, she couldn't quite make herself believe that.

Oliver did come, once. He came into the kitchen where Gwen was sterilizing yet more of Uncle Bruce's instruments.

"Gwen, I'm so sorry. What can I do to help?"

"I don't know," Gwen said distractedly. "You'll have to ask Uncle Bruce. He's in charge and knows what should be done. I just take orders from him."

Oliver moved to stand right in front of her, so she had to focus on him. She blinked. Had he grown taller? Certainly he suddenly seemed much older than he had at the start of the summer.

"Gwen," he said, taking her hand. "I know the doctors are doing everything they can for Mrs. Ruth. Right now I'm more concerned about _you_. You aren't a nurse, aren't in the medical profession at all. You came out here this summer to be a housekeeper. I think you are wonderful for jumping in like this and helping your uncle, but I'm worried that you aren't going to be able to handle it. What can I do to help _you_?"

Gwen flushed and yanked her hand away. How dare he imply that she was weak, that she couldn't stand up to the pressure of helping Uncle Bruce? What did he mean by "jumping in," as though she hadn't put any thought into this matter at all? She _had_ thought about what was involved, and she had decided that her aunt's life—and the life of the baby inside of her—was more important than any of her fears or perceived inabilities.

And what gave Oliver the right to be worried about her, anyway?

"I'm fine," she said through gritted teeth, the slow-burning Blake anger kindling within her. "This isn't about me at all, Oliver. It's about my aunt, and the baby, and doing whatever is necessary to keep them alive. I'm sorry you don't think I'm good enough to help with that, but I'm doing the best I can, and if all you're going to do is stand there and make feeble remarks, you might as well go home!"

And with that, she none-too-gently shoved him toward the door, and smiled with more than her usual graciousness at Hayden, coming in just then.

"Hullo, Gwen," he said, nodding casually at Oliver, who glared at his unconscious back as he passed. "Any errands for me today?"

"I'm sure Uncle Bruce will have plenty," Gwen said, slamming the screen door shut behind Oliver. "If you'd like to sit down, I'll tell him you're here."

"No hurry," Hayden said, doing as he was bid. "My time is yours."

Hayden Wentworth might be an irresponsible flirt, and Oliver Grant might be the most dependable young man in the Glen, but at that moment Gwen thought she would take a _hundred_ Haydens over Oliver.

Chloe could have him, and welcome.

Later that evening, as she was collapsing into her bed, Gwen thought hazily that she might have been a bit unfair to Oliver. He probably hadn't meant for his words to come out the way she took them—he was probably trying to be sweet and caring. Unfortunately, it seemed that everything he did or said this summer just rubbed her the wrong way.

"Maybe I should apologize," she murmured sleepily, before deciding not to. He seemed to be taking everything _she_ said or did the wrong way, too—only in the opposite direction, assuming any kind word or action meant that she was falling in love with him. An apology just might encourage his romantic endeavours even more.

Better just to let things be.

Besides, she _was_ still a little annoyed at his implication that she was unfit to help her uncle.

And on that thought, Gwen fell sound asleep, without wasting one more thought on Oliver, Hayden, Tryg, or any boy at all.

* * *

The very next day, Aunt Ruth's fever finally broke. Uncle Bruce wept when she opened her eyes and scolded him for hovering over her bed. Seeing those tears from her big, strong uncle, Gwen no longer felt quite so bad about her tears at night. Maybe tears didn't always mean weakness, after all.

Winnie and Ruthie wanted to come home immediately, but Uncle Bruce insisted that they stay with their grandparents a while longer. Aunt Ruth was still too weak to safely have the baby, and Uncle Bruce wanted the house to be absolutely quiet and calm while she regained her strength.

"We can be calm!" Winnie cried, and looked sulky when everyone, even Ruthie, laughed at her.

"I'm glad they are staying with Grandmother Meredith," Gwen confessed to Ava later, when Ava stopped by with her daily provisions. "I don't think they have any idea how close they came to losing their mother, and if they see her as white and weak as she is, I think they'll just get scared unnecessarily. Besides, I have enough on my hands with helping Uncle Bruce; I don't think I could manage two youngsters as well."

"You've done marvellously well," Ava said, splitting open a scone and buttering it before handing it across the table to Gwen. "I so admire the way you stepped up and just did what was needed, without any fuss or bother about it."

"It didn't feel that way," Gwen said, biting into the soft scone. "I felt like I was floundering for air all the time!"

"But you kept on, just the same." Ava slowly and deliberately chose a scone for herself. "I think that's courage—or maturity—or character, whatever you want to call it. Feeling afraid or helpless, but acting anyway, just because you have to." She looked grim. "I wish Hay could learn some of that."

"Hay was wonderful through this—as were you," Gwen protested. She polished off her scone and reached for another. Now that the crisis was past, she was _ravenous_ all the time.

"Oh yes, he makes himself useful, but he has no gumption of his own. The property falls to him, you know, and I'm so afraid of what will happen to it once he inherits. It has been in our family ever since Napoleon was defeated—our ancestor distinguished himself in the war and was given a knighthood and land. Father managed to hang onto it after the last war, when so many of the upper classes had to sell off parts of their property, and if Hay goes and loses it on us—or worse, sells to some rich American—I shall never forgive him!"

Gwen tried to imagine if, say, Jack tried to sell Ingleside, or Jeremy lost Mount Holly. She would be sad, she knew, but could never feel so passionate about a house and land as Ava clearly did. She didn't quite know what to say.

"Father has told me that it's up to me to keep Hay from doing anything rash, but you've seen him, he never listens to me."

Ava had never been quite so open before. Gwen reached across the table and squeezed her friend's hand. "He listens to you, Ave. I know he respects your opinion, and he wouldn't do anything you disapproved of."

"I told him not to flirt with you, and he completely ignored that," Ava said. "I told him he was going to damage your reputation, even if he didn't break your heart, and he just laughed and told me I worried too much."

"Don't worry," Gwen said, her mouth twisting wryly. "I haven't any reputation to damage, here in the Glen." How Chloe's careless lies about her had spread! Even people who had forgotten what the original claims were against her still suspected that Gwen Blake was … well … not quite a lady.

"And my heart is in no danger of being broken. Hay and I understand each other."

Ava sighed again. "I do so wish you were of our class. I would love to have you for a sister."

"I wouldn't do at all for Hay," Gwen said positively. "I could never take him seriously, nor him me. He needs to marry someone … well, someone more like you, who could help him take life with more than just a twinkle in his eye and charm."

Ava couldn't help but laugh. "Yes, that sums him up very well!"

"What about you?" Gwen couldn't help but ask. "What sort of a man do you want to marry?"

"Not someone like Hay, that's certain," Ava said quickly. "I don't want to have to be a mother to my husband. I want someone who is strong, but who isn't afraid of a strong-minded wife, either. Someone like the stories I've heard of Sir Frederick, the sea captain who was knighted. Lady Wentworth, Anne, had a mind and spirit, very unusual in their era, and he respected her and loved her deeply. That's the sort of marriage I want." She laughed. "Not too much to ask for, is it?"

Gwen responded to the cynicism in her voice rather than the words themselves. "I hope you find him, someday."

"What about you?" Ava asked, neatly turning the conversation from herself. "What sort of a man are you looking for?"

"Oh, I don't know. Someone who doesn't mind my clumsiness or social awkwardness. Someone who appreciates me for me, who isn't always trying to protect me or make me feel inferior. Someone who makes me laugh, but also can be serious." She sighed. "You're right, I think we want the impossible."

"Well, if our perfect men never show themselves, we will just have to live together in a small cottage near the hall, keeping an eye on Hay and the flibbertigibbet he's likely to marry."

"Deal," Gwen said with a laugh. It certainly sounded more appealing than marrying someone like Oliver, always patronizing and suffocating her!

Even being an old maid wouldn't be so bad if she could share it with someone like Ava.

"Besides," she said, following her own train of thought. "I want to have plenty of adventures before I settle down and marry, anyway."

"Yes!" Ava said, her eyes lighting up. "Travel the world!"

"See life!"

"Visit Africa!"

"Write books and become famous!"

"Climb a mountain!"

"Perhaps we simply aren't the marrying type."

"Well then, first we'll explore the world together, and when we're bored with that, we can settled down in that cottage."

"Now that sounds perfect."

The two friends clinked their teacups together to seal the bargain.

"What is the world coming to," Uncle Bruce said mournfully, "When two beautiful women decide they would rather have adventures than get married? What _can_ the men be thinking to let you two slip through their fingers?"

Gwen laughed, happy to see her uncle teasing again. Ava, however, bristled just a little.

"What, you think the only thing women are good for is running a house and having babies?"

Uncle Bruce held up his hands. "Never! Not when Gwen here has pulled her weight better than any seventeen-year-old boy could have done, these last couple of weeks. In my experience, strength of mind and spirit comes in all shapes and sizes. It cannot be restricted to men, or to women, for that matter."

Ava inclined her head. "Sorry. I get a little testy, sometimes. Father often tells me he wishes I could inherit, and it is so very frustrating that the hall must pass to the eldest son, regardless of whether he would be the best caretaker or not."

"Primogeniture is an ugly law," Uncle Bruce agreed gravely.

"How is Mrs. Ruth?" Ava asked, changing the subject again.

"Better every day," Uncle Bruce said, brightening at once. "If we can keep this up for another week, little Meredith can make his appearance any time after that without danger."

Gwen groaned. "Don't say that, Uncle Bruce! Don't tempt fate!"

"We've beaten fate once already, Gwen, I think we can dare to face it again."

"You say that now …" Gwen said darkly. As Uncle Bruce left the kitchen to take his scones and tea into Aunt Ruth's room, Gwen looked helplessly at her friend.

"The baby is going to come tonight, now. I can feel it in my bones."

Ava's eyes crinkled as she laughed. "Then should I stay the night, just in case?"

"Yes," Gwen said emphatically. "We are going to need all the help we can get."

"I'll run back to the village and let Uncle know," Ava said. "And collect my things. Don't worry, Gwen! I shan't let you face this alone."

Lynde would have told her not to be superstitious. Fanny would have moaned and wrung her hands. At the moment, Gwen could think of no one besides Ava she would rather have by her side when Uncle Bruce challenged fate.

Except, perhaps, Phil or Jeremy. But even then, when it came to childbirth, another woman would probably be better.

Uncle Bruce could be as democratic as he wanted, but Gwen couldn't think of very many boys who could handle childbirth the way another girl could. Although Jeremy came closer than any other boy she could imagine!


	14. Chapter 14

Uncle Bruce did laugh when Ava arrived back at the house with an overnight bag and told him she was there to help see them through the night after his rash declaration.

"Ah Gwen," he said. "And you, a reverend's daughter, to be so superstitious! You know it's not fate that controls our destiny, it's divine Providence."

"Man proposes but God disposes, Dr. Bruce," Ava said. "Sometimes the good Lord makes us eat our words just to remind us that He _is_ the one who controls our destinies, not us."

Uncle Bruce shook his head. "This is why I got into medicine instead of following my father into ministry. Too much theology for me to grasp!"

"I'm always getting scolded by our curate for challenging accepted theological views," Ava told Gwen ruefully after Uncle Bruce left. A fisherman's baby over-harbour had been scalded with some boiling water (the oldest daughter was trying to help her mother, and dropped the pot when it was too heavy, scalding the baby with the wave of hot water dashing across the floor), and Grandfather thought that two doctors would be more use than one—one for the baby, and one to help calm the hysterical daughter who had caused the accident. "Apparently women are not supposed to think about theology or anything more than having babies and cleaning up after their husbands."

"Ugh," was Gwen's brief and expressive reply.

"Exactly," Ava said. She grinned. "Of course, the vicar thinks it is wonderful that I read so much, and think about what I read, and want to discuss it, so he's always telling the curate to encourage my questions, not squelch me!"

"Is the vicar young and handsome?" Gwen asked with a twinkle.

Ava laughed and tossed her head. "No, he's seventy years old with no hair left on his head but plenty growing out of his nose! The curate _is_ young and handsome, which is why I so enjoy taking him down a notch or two. He's far too inclined to think himself on a plane above the rest of the us mere mortals, and that all personable young women are going to fall at his feet."

"Oh, Ava," Gwen said, shaking her head.

"You try growing up with Hay for a brother, and see how sweet and demure _you_ are," Ava said.

"No, thank you. I much prefer Phil and Jo. Although Jo does often make us tear out our hair and wonder if he's going to someday save the world or destroy it."

"A real _wunderkind_, is he?"

"He is a wonder, but I'm not sure he's a prodigy," Gwen said. "Actually, when it comes to Jo, I'm not too sure about anything."

"How I wish the rest of your family had come out to the Island this summer! You talk so much about them, and I would love to meet them all. Your brilliant Phil, and sweet, dramatic Lee, and no-words-to-describe Jo, and especially handsome and talented Jeremy." Ava's grin was pure mischief.

Gwen laughed. "If your brother was talking like that about one of my girl cousins, I'd know he meant that he wanted to flirt with her, but with you, I know it's only that you'd enjoy taking Jeremy down a peg or two!"

"You have gotten to know us quite well this summer, haven't you? And I suppose you think your Jeremy is perfection, and doesn't need any trimming down to size."

"No," Gwen said honestly, considering it. "I think Jeremy is wonderful, yes, but I also know that I am prejudiced. I mean, he could come to me and tell me that he had robbed the bank and shot a teller, and I would only say, 'Well, you go hide, and I'll clean up the mess.' It probably would be very good for him to meet someone who doesn't succumb to his charm."

Ava laughed, and then both of the girls froze as Aunt Ruth's bell rang out. They exchanged a look, and bolted for the bedroom.

Aunt Ruth was lying back on the pillows, eyes closed and one hand clutching the coverlet.

"Girls," she said faintly. "Could one of you … fetch me a glass of water? And then … maybe … go and get your uncle?" Then she gasped in pain.

"I'll get the water," Ava said at once.

"Is it … the baby?" Gwen asked.

Aunt Ruth released a breath and nodded. "The pains have been coming for a little while, but I didn't think they meant anything. But now … they are coming closer together … and I think it's the real thing."

Ava brought in a tumbler full of water, and Aunt Ruth managed to get most of it down before another contraction gripped her. The girls stood one on either side and supported her through it.

"Thank you," she said, a flush coming out on top of her pale skin.

"Do you want me to go get your uncle? Or should I find Hay and see if he can take our uncle's car?" Ava asked Gwen.

"No," Gwen said, her lips set in a firm line. "The roads over-harbour aren't fit for automobiles, and neither you nor Hay know the area well enough to find him quickly. I'm still the fastest runner on the Island. I'll go."

"Hurry," was the only plea Ava would allow herself to make.

Gwen nodded and dashed out to find her running shoes. She had them on within moments, and without bothering with even a hat, she bolted out the door, running the race of her life.

* * *

"Take the horse," Grandfather said instantly, as Gwen gasped out her story and Uncle Bruce nearly dropped the bandaged baby on the floor. "There's no saddle, but I daresay you can manage bareback. I'll send someone for the buggy later."

Uncle Bruce nodded, set the baby very carefully in its mother's arms, and was out the door in a flash. Grandfather brought Gwen some water and stood over her to make sure she drank it slowly.

"Do you want to wait here with me and come back when I'm finished?" he asked.

Gwen shook her head and forced herself to stand upright again. "No, thank you, Grandfather. I think I should get back as soon as I can to help Uncle Bruce and Ava."

Grandfather's smile was knowing. "I expected as much. I only wish I could go with you, but my work is here. Go a bit easier this time, though, Gwen? No point in you killing yourself."

Gwen nodded. She wasn't sure how much more punishment her legs could take, anyway. She'd never sprinted as much, for as long periods of time, before this, and her body was already letting her know it did not appreciate being used in this way.

"I'll do it the way I was trained," she assured Grandfather. "Steady and easy, only sprinting near the end." She kissed his cheek, spared one relieved glance for the baby who seemed to be resting peacefully with the sorrowful (and confused) little mother, and was out the door again.

She paced herself this time, knowing that Uncle Bruce was likely already back at the house, and that he and Ava could manage without her for a little while at least. She also didn't want to be completely useless by the time she got back, or even make more work for them!

"Hullo, Gwen!"

Gwen recognized Tryg's voice at once and paused. Her friend looked exhausted, with big dark circles under his eyes and lines of strain plain on his face.

"What's wrong?" she blurted without thinking.

He gave a tired smile. "You wouldn't have heard. I just heard about your aunt today, myself." His smile vanished. "My aunt passed away this week."

Gwen gaped. "Oh, _Tryg_. I'm so, so sorry." No wonder he hadn't been by to see if he could help while Aunt Ruth was sick! "I wish I had known."

"And I wish I had known about your aunt. Is she better now?"

That recalled Gwen to her task. "Yes—well, she is better, but the baby is coming now, right now, and oh Tryg, I'm so sorry, but I must get back to them." She had a hundred things she wanted to say to him, one of which was what his plans were now, but she absolutely couldn't dawdle on her way back to Aunt Ruth.

"Of course you must!" Tryg said instantly. "I'm sorry for stopping you—I just saw you and wanted to let you know I was thinking of you and your aunt. Go. We'll talk later, when everything has calmed down for both of us."

She gave him a grateful smile, thankful that he was so understanding, blinked away a few unexpected tears that sprang from nowhere, and began to run again, pushing her tired body just a little bit more now, to make up for the time lost while talking to Tryg.

* * *

Ava met Gwen at the door, and the calm, insouciant English lady had turned into a wild-eyed young woman who pulled Gwen nearly off her feet getting her inside.

"I am _never_ having children," she said emphatically, and pushed Gwen into the bedroom.

Gwen took one look and backed right out again.

"Neither am I!"

"Hot water!" Uncle Bruce barked. "Now!"

"It's your turn," Ava said. "I've been assisting while you've been out enjoying freedom."

Gwen thought about clutching her chest and insisting she needed more time to recover from her two runs. Then for some reason Tryg popped into her mind. His aunt had just died, and he still took the time to let her know he was thinking of her and Aunt Ruth. With that sort of example, how could she be a coward?

She squared her shoulders. "Right. Hot water is coming, Uncle Bruce!"

Over the next hour, they fell into a good routine. Ava kept things running in the kitchen and bathroom, Uncle Bruce took care of Aunt Ruth, and Gwen ran between the two. Then, just as she was bringing in another set of hot towels, she nearly fainted to see Uncle Bruce kneeling by the bed.

"Support her," he said tersely. "The baby's on its way."

Without even thinking, Gwen screamed for Ava and darted to the head of the bed. Ava, white as the sheets, joined her, and they braced Aunt Ruth's shoulders as she cried, squirmed, and pushed. One—two—three—and the baby slid into Uncle Bruce's waiting hands.

"It's a girl," he whispered. "A beautiful, healthy baby girl."

Aunt Ruth began to cry tears of joy and exhaustion. Uncle Bruce gave out more orders for cleaning the baby and Aunt Ruth and cutting the cord and other things about which Gwen would have quite happily never known.

Then, the red-faced, gurgling infant was placed in her mother's waiting arms, Uncle Bruce sat down on the bed next to them, and Ava and Gwen slipped out to the kitchen to collapse wearily into the wooden chairs.

"What did we just do?" Ava asked.

"I don't even want to think about it," Gwen said.

Ava shuddered. "Well, now I know for certain I never want to be a doctor or midwife. Or a mother."

Gwen wasn't so sure. The experience had been horrific for them, but the utter rapture on Aunt Ruth's face upon seeing her child for the first time might, she suspected, make up for the misery of labor.

"I don't suppose you feel inclined to make us some tea?" Ava suggested hopefully.

"You mean move?" Gwen snickered. "Not terribly likely. What time is it, anyway?"

"Nearly midnight, I think."

"I wonder if we should call Ingleside and the manse now, or wait until morning?"

"The telephone is across the kitchen," Ava pointed.

"We can wait until morning," Gwen decided.

"Bed, then?"

"In a moment," Gwen said without conviction.

Then Uncle Bruce came out of the bedroom, beaming all over.

"They are resting now," he whispered. "Would you girls like some tea while I call the proud grandparents, and tell the girls about their new sister?"

"Dr. Bruce, you are a hero," Ava pronounced.

* * *

The girls slept until close to noon the next day. When they arose, after eating the food that Grandmother Blythe had brought from Ingleside's kitchen for them, Uncle Bruce ushered them into the bedroom to see the new baby properly.

"She's beautiful," Ava whispered, looking at the dark hair and long lashes in awe. "Did we really help bring her into the world?"

"You certainly did," Aunt Ruth laughed. "We couldn't have done it without you."

Aunt Ruth was still thin and pale, but she looked more like herself than she had all summer, and Gwen happily decided her aunt was out of danger.

"What did you name her?" she asked.

"We hadn't decided yet. We have Rosemary Ruth, for Bruce's mother and mine, and Ellen Winifred, for Bruce's Aunt Ellen and his grandmother. We want to do another family name, but we're not sure what. Do you girls have any suggestions?"

"What is your grandmother's name?" Ava asked.

"One was Catherine, and the other Lois."

"Catherine," Ava and Gwen said in unison.

"And what for a middle name? We will probably call her by her middle name, as we do with Ruthie and Winnie, so we want it to be something both pretty and well-wearing."

Gwen contemplated the baby. With her dark hair and deep blue eyes, she looked very like her Scottish grandfather. Aunt Ruth's had come from Scotland originally as well …

"What part of Scotland is your family from?"

"The isle of Iona, both the Merediths and my family. Bruce and I used to joke about our ancestors probably being neighbours," Aunt Ruth said. She looked startled. "Iona?"

"Iona," Uncle Bruce said, hovering in the doorway. "Nona?"

"Catherine Iona 'Nona' Meredith," Ava completed. "I like it."

"So do I," said Aunt Ruth, looking pleased. "Gwen, you're brilliant."

Gwen shrugged. "All those stories, and making up names for my characters, must have paid off!"

"I'm off to fetch the twins," Uncle Bruce said. "They are clamouring to meet their baby sister and see their Mummy."

"Oh, I miss them so," Aunt Ruth said wistfully.

"I think I should go back to Uncle Edward and Hay," Ava said.

Gwen felt the same impulse, to leave the happy family to themselves for a little while at least, so they could all get acquainted with the newest member. She knew she could go to Ingleside and visit with everyone there, but she was rather inclined to be alone.

She could go to the harbour, but that was known now to be her favourite spot, and where people would go to find her, if they wanted to talk. She didn't want to see Oliver, or even Isaiah right now.

Then she thought of the little cave where she and Isaiah had had their picnic with Tryg that one day. It was a bit of a hike, but nobody would think to look for her there.

"I think I'll go out and get some fresh air," she said vaguely. Aunt Ruth and Uncle Bruce were already cooing over Baby Nona, and barely even noticed her leaving.

It was good to get outside in the sunshine, and even better to be getting away from people. All sorts of thoughts and emotions were chasing around inside her, and she just needed to sort them all out.


	15. Chapter 15

Something had shifted for Gwen since Aunt Ruth's fever, and most especially since Baby Nona's birth. She felt … different, and yet she didn't know how, or why. It was why she had wanted to be alone, to see if she could figure out these odd new emotions and thoughts coursing through her.

Yet, oddly enough, now she was here at the cave, she found she couldn't think about herself at all. All she could think of was Tryg, and what a terrible time he must be having. She felt guilty for feeling badly that he hadn't been by to inquire after Aunt Ruth. If only she'd known! Grandmother and Grandfather must have known, but they wouldn't have wanted to distract her while Aunt Ruth was in such danger.

Or would they have told her at all? Gwen realized that her friendship with Tryg felt so natural and comfortable to her, that it had never occurred to her that the rest of her family (barring Isaiah) might not know about it. Everyone teased her about her other two boy friends, Hay and Oliver, but nobody ever said anything about Tryg—and knowing how much her uncles and grandfather were given to teasing, Gwen was quite certain they _would_ have said something.

True, they did have their collaboration, and Grandmother had helped them polish it, but even she seemed more intent on Gwen's friendship with Hay than her partnership with Tryg.

It was a small thing, undefinable really, but Gwen couldn't quite get around the fact that their friendship was so … _unobtrusive_. She had never tried to make it a secret, and yet there it was. Likely nobody outside of Isaiah or Phil would understand just why she was so upset for Tryg's loss.

And what was he going to do now? How would this affect his choice regarding education? Would his uncle and mother still move out west? Would he feel obligated to stay with them now?

So many questions, and she would get no answers to any of them sitting in this dim cave. Gwen stood up, suddenly disgusted with herself. Why was she hiding away, brooding over her silly feelings, when she had a friend who was suffering?

She left the cave and headed briskly toward Tryg's uncle's farm. Her friend needed her, and that was more important than figuring out her place in the world.

* * *

Gwen had only seen Tryg's uncle a few times, but even if she had seen him every day of her life, she was sure she still wouldn't have recognized him. Mr. Arnold was gaunt and haggard, his eyes haunted and shadowed with pain.

"You're Doc Blythe's granddaughter, aren't you?" he grunted when she introduced herself.

"Yes, I am," she said, surprised not only that he knew who she was, but that he would mention it in his current condition.

"Fine man, your granddad," he said, further surprising her. "Even though he's not officially doctoring anymore, he came out every day to visit my wife, even when she was beyond hope." He paused for a moment, staring off into the distance, while Gwen swallowed the lump in her throat. "Yes, a fine man."

"Is—is Tryg around?" Gwen ventured.

Mr. Arnold came back to earth. "Oh aye, he's around back, in the barn. Go ahead and say hello. And tell your grandfather I'll be stopping by sometime soon to see him."

"I'll do that," Gwen said. "And—sir?"

He looked down at her flushed, nervous face, and his hard voice gentled. "Yes, lass?"

"I'm so very sorry about Mrs. Arnold."

The grizzled farmer patted her hand. "Thank you, my dear," was all he said, but somehow Gwen felt immeasurably better for their exchange.

Tryg was indeed in the barn, cleaning out the hayloft in preparation for the upcoming harvest. He stopped work immediately upon seeing Gwen, who found herself blushing at the sight of his bare chest.

"Hold on!" he called to her. "I'll be right down."

He vanished from sight, and Gwen wondered just why seeing him without a shirt shoulder affect her so. She went swimming with her male cousins and friends often; it wasn't as though she'd never seen a masculine chest before.

Maybe it was just because she hadn't been expecting it. Maybe because, when one is paying a sympathy call, one doesn't expect partial nakedness.

Whatever it was, by the time Tryg climbed down the ladder (now properly clothed from head to toe), Gwen had her blushes under control.

"What can I do for you?" Tryg asked, wiping his face with a blue hanky.

"I just … Aunt Ruth had the baby, and everyone is fine, and they didn't need me, and I felt so badly that I hadn't heard about your aunt …" Gwen felt herself floundering, and wondered, again, just what was wrong with her.

Tryg's sweat-streaked face was transformed by his gentle smile. "Thank you. I've finished up here. Shall we take a walk?"

Gwen agreed, thinking it might be good for her to get out of the dusty, dim barn.

They strolled through the orchard where the apples were just starting to show rosy tints through the fresh green. Gwen's mind drifted back to the first time she met Tryg, in this very orchard. Even then, he had stood out from the other boys of her acquaintance. He reminded her of Phil sometimes, in his kindness, though Phil was solidly practical where Tryg was a dreamer like Jack and Gwen herself.

"Matthew MacAllister has bought the farm," Tryg said abruptly, ducking underneath a low branch, heavy-laden with golden fruit.

"Oh," Gwen said. She plucked a leaf as she passed another tree, and twirled it aimlessly between her fingers.

"Uncle and Mother are heading out West as soon as everything is settled. Next month, probably."

"And … what of you?"

Tryg squinted up against the bright sun. "MacAllister has offered to keep me on as hired hand as long as I want. He'll even pay me a little extra after room and board. I figure I'll stay on through the autumn and part of winter, and start college during the spring semester."

"Oh." Gwen felt warmed all through. "Oh, I'm so glad you are still going to be able to go to college."

Tryg shrugged. "I offered to go with Uncle and Mother, after my aunt's passing, but they both told me to stay and follow my own inclination. In Uncle's words: 'I think drawing a durn-fool way to spend your life, boy, but it's your life, not mine, and you can waste it as you please.' Mother was a bit more gracious, but she said much the same thing. Then she mentioned that since Anja's music school is here in the east, she'd feel much better if I was at least in the same region, so there'd be family nearby if anything happened."

Gwen mentally applauded the astute Mrs. Ahlberg. Tryg would feel much less guilty about following his own path if he thought he was comforting his mother and helping his sister at the same time.

"I've already started looking at schools," Tryg confessed. "Part of me feels like I shouldn't, so soon after my aunt's death, but then again, I do need to start applying if I want to start this winter."

"I don't think you should feel guilty at all," Gwen said. "It's not as though looking into college means you feel any less sad about your aunt."

"No." Tryg kicked the ground. "Although, if I'm perfectly honest, I don't think I was terribly sad to begin with. I'm sad, of course, but … my aunt never liked me, and she hated my father, and she always made my mother feel guilty about having to come back and live with Uncle … I'm a horrible person for saying all this about her!"

"No, you're not!" Gwen stopped indignantly. "Death doesn't change who a person was. If, say, Chloe were to suddenly die, I would feel sad, of course, but it wouldn't—it _couldn't_—change the fact that she was always awful to me, and to my siblings, and that we were never friends, and I would be a _hypocrite_ if I pretended differently just because she was in Heaven now."

Tryg chuckled. "Well, at least I picked the right person to confess to!"

"I would ten times rather have honesty than politeness," Gwen said. "And if I died unexpectedly, I would hope _you_ would be honest about it, rather than making all the polite noises most people do."

Tryg turned his head away, perhaps to look at something in the distance, perhaps to hide his face. "I'll remember that."

For a moment, intensity shimmered almost visibly in the summer air between them. Then Tryg started to walk again, and the moment passed.

"What about you, have you decided at all about college?"

"I think I have," Gwen said, realizing only as she said it that she had.

"And?"

"I'm going to go," she said with determination. "Only not to Redmond. But there are other good colleges in Nova Scotia, where I could go and still be close to my family."

"Not Redmond? But I didn't think it was allowed for anyone in your family to go anywhere else?"

Gwen chuckled. "Haven't you heard Chloe and Aunt Rilla? I'm not a proper Blythe at all. I might as well carry on with shattering tradition, since I've already begun. And even though Grandmother and Grandfather Blake went to Redmond, they never cared for family expectations."

"Sensible of them," Tryg commented.

"And much more comfortable for their family," Gwen added with an impish twinkle.

Tryg laughed. "Well, some of the schools I'm considering are in Nova Scotia, too. Who knows? We might end up at the same place."

"That would be fun," Gwen said. "We could collaborate on more stories—unless you had more than enough of me with the last one."

"Not at all," Tryg smiled. "If you weren't going to be going home so soon, I'd say we should start another one already."

Gwen felt a warm glow at the thought of going home. She had been so busy these last several days with Aunt Ruth that she'd almost forgotten how much she missed her family. It wouldn't be long now before she would be home, and then Phil would be home right after that, and then they would all be together again.

"We might need some more practice, anyway," she said. "How many rejections have we gotten?"

"Too many," Tryg grimaced. "I sent it out to the last one on our list right before my aunt's funeral. I'm expecting that rejection slip any day now."

"Oh well," Gwen said. "We didn't really think we'd get published."

"True. And it was fun to do, even if nobody else but the two of us and your grandmother ever see it."

They shared a companionable smile and ambled on through the drowsy orchard in contented silence.

* * *

"West House

"Glen St. Mary, PEI

"August 19, 1938

"Dear Phil,

"I've decided that I am going to try to go to college, after all.

"And now I picture you saying, "But I thought you already _were_ planning on college?'

"Well, I wasn't. I just didn't want to tell anybody that I was unsure, for fear of disappointing you all (stop rolling your eyes at the paper, brother). I know you would have told me I could do anything I wanted with my life, but you would have been let down on the inside, no matter what you _said_, and that would have been worse than expressed disappointment.

"At any rate, I have made up my mind definitively. Somehow, between Aunt Ruth getting so sick, helping with Baby Nona's birth, and talking with Tryg after his aunt's death, it all just became so simple and obvious to me. I want to be a writer. I _know_ this. I don't want any other kind of career, and I certainly don't want to just get married and start having babies as soon as I'm done with high school. Good grief. Can you imagine me as a wife? I can't either.

"Well then, if I want to be a writer, I'd better learn everything I can about writing, hadn't I? And I'd better experience some life, too, wouldn't you think? And where better to do both of those things at once than college?

"Besides, college will help round out the rest of my education, which will be good for life in general, also.

"So I'm going. Only not to Redmond, because I do not want to have to follow in the footsteps of every single one of our relatives back to our grandparents. I've already ordered some brochures from some other schools in Nova Scotia, just to see what my other options are. I know you are already planning on going to McGill, but I think Toronto's a bit further from home than I want to go. I would like to be able to come home on weekends to help Mums out around the house.

"Besides which, I really don't think I'm quite bright enough for McGill!

"We can talk more about this in person, soon. I'm coming home next week! And you'll be home the week after that, and oh, how I am looking forward to hearing all about your adventures with Uncle Carl on the expedition!

"I'm going to be a senior this year, Phil. I will graduate in the spring, and you will graduate the spring after that. We're practically grown-ups. In some ways, we are grown-ups already. I certainly don't feel like a little girl anymore, not after helping Aunt Ruth and Uncle Bruce this summer.

"I must go—Ave, Hay and I are going on a picnic by the shore in a few minutes. Tomorrow Isaiah and I are having one last ramble together. The Fords are heading back to their home soon, too. Aunt Betty and the children are getting ready to meet Uncle Carl; Aunt Nan and Uncle Jerry and Rosie and Gil have already left for Avonlea.

"Before long, Aunt Faith and Uncle Jem will be back, and they'll have to face the fact that Jack and Lynde are just as fond of each other (if not more) than they were before. How do I know this? Well, even though Jack promised his parents he wouldn't write to Lynde, that hasn't stopped him from writing to me. He's too honourable to include messages for Lynde in his letters to me, as that would be going against the spirit of what his parents asked, but he has talked about her in every letter. Every single one!

"And of course, Lynde talks to me about Jack as well, so I, even though I don't talk to them about the other, know better than maybe even they do just how strong their feelings are for each other! Poor Uncle Jem and Aunt Faith. I am afraid they will have to resign themselves to letting go of their notions of how Jack's life ought to go.

"The summer is ending, Phil, and it's been a big one. So much has happened, for me, and I'm sure for you, even if your letters have been horribly uncommunicative.

"I miss you. See you soon.

"Love always,

"Gwen."


	16. Chapter 16

Hay and Ava were cooing at Baby Nona downstairs when Gwen came down after finishing her letter to Phil—well, Hay was cooing, and Ava was warily admiring her from a distance.

"Come now," Aunt Ruth said. "You helped bring her into this world. Don't you want to hold her?"

"No thank you," Ava said, swallowing hard.

Hay gave Aunt Ruth his brightest smile. "Ave just doesn't like babies very much, Mrs. Ruth."

"I like them," Ava snapped. "They just don't like me. I never know how to hold them, and they always start crying the moment they are in my arms."

"I'd cry too, the way you hold babies—as if they are fragile glass ornaments!"

Aunt Ruth held the gurgling bundle out to Hay, her eyes twinkling with mischief and fun. "Well, show us how it's done, Master Wentworth."

"With pleasure," he said, and promptly scooped Nona up into his arms. She opened her big blue eyes, blinked sleepily, and went back to sleep with a contented sigh.

"Well, I never," Aunt Ruth said, her voice showing her astonishment. "I have _never_ seen a boy your age so knacky with babies, not even lads who have dozens of younger siblings!"

Hay's low chuckle rolled from his chest. "No female can resist my charm." He winked at Gwen, who snorted.

"Until they get to know you," she parried, and Hay's chuckle turned into an outright laugh.

"Ave! What have you been teaching her?"

"Not a thing," Ava said. "She's just spent enough time around you to find out what you're really like."

Baby Nona woke again and started to squall. Hay cuddled her close. "That's right, my pretty one! Defend my honour to these two heartless creatures."

"I'm afraid she's hungry again," Aunt Ruth sighed.

Hay wrinkled his nose. "And wet, I'd guess."

"Another reason I don't like to hold babies," Ava murmured to Gwen, who nodded in emphatic agreement.

"Hand her over," Aunt Ruth said with resignation. "You young people have fun on your picnic."

"We will," Gwen said.

"Yes, indeed," Ava said. "This is our last week here, too, you know. Next week we are back to England and our real life. I'll be glad to get back, but …"

"But never again will we have such a wonderful, carefree summer in the land of red roads and blue skies," Hay finished. Then he smiled again. "At least we still have today, eh?" He held out an arm to each girl. "Come, ladies. Mrs Ruth, Nona," he bowed. "We will be back to say farewell before we leave for good."

Aunt Ruth waved distractedly at them, already focused on the baby's needs.

Gwen slipped her arm free of Hayden's. "I need to fetch the basket," she explained at his wounded look.

Baskets in hand, the trio set off for the shore, their blithe voices rising along with the birdsong. One dark-haired, dark-browed young man, walking hopefully toward West House, heard and saw them, and drew those black brows more closely together in a scowl.

Why couldn't Gwen see what a scoundrel Wentworth was? Why was she wasting her time with _them_, and snubbing him? _He_ cared about her—he wouldn't break her heart, like Wentworth was going to. Anyone could see that Wentworth wasn't the type to be serious about a girl like Gwen. Not like he was.

When would she see that they were meant to be together?

Oliver Grant turned abruptly and headed back down the hill, toward Ingleside and Rainbow Valley, where more congenial company awaited him. Chloe might be cloying, but at least she preferred his company to the _Wentworths_.

* * *

Happily, Gwen remained unaware of her would-be beau's wounded feelings. Her entire attention was given up to the glorious sunshine-y day, the sultry air, the salt breeze coming from the harbour, and her two friends. Hay was at his outrageous best, keeping Gwen in constant gales of laughter, and even wringing a reluctant chuckle or two from Ava.

"What will I do back in England, without you to appreciate me?" he said plaintively.

"I'm sure there are plenty of girls back there who 'appreciate' you," Gwen said dryly.

Hay's rich laugh floated out. "Well, maybe, but none like you."

"Heavens!" Ava blurted. "I do believe that's the first real compliment I've ever heard my brother pay a young woman."

"I give compliments all the time, Ava," Hay protested with a wounded look.

"Not real ones," she countered.

"I shall treasure it always," Gwen assured them. All joking aside, she did feel rather pleased about Hay's words. It was nice to think that he didn't put her in the category of all his other girls. She was suddenly very glad she hadn't let him kiss her that one moonlit evening. Without anything definite to base it on, she was certain that would have changed how he viewed her, whether he realized it or not.

"I'm going to have a hard time adjusting, myself," she confessed. "Going from running a household and commanding my own time to being a schoolgirl again."

"And the minister's daughter," Ava added with a sly grin.

Gwen inclined her head. There certainly were restriction on all of them when they were at home, expectations of how they ought to act and think. Mother and Dad always told them to be themselves and not fret about what the gossips would say, but they all four knew it would reflect badly on their parents if they did so, and none of them would risk that.

Except Jo, and he only sometimes. Besides, most people didn't expect him to behave like everyone else, anyway.

"Lucky Ava," Hayden said. "No expectations on her."

"And you do?"

"Of course!" Hay looked indignant. "I am the heir, after all. Heaven's sake, why do you think I'm living so reckless a life right now? Because I know that this autumn, I'm going to be starting at the RNC, and after that I'll be in the Navy, and I'll have to be _respectable_, and uphold the family honour. This is my last chance to be free from the burden of the Wentworth name."

Ava was looking at him strangely, but Gwen spoke first. "RNC?"

"Royal Naval College," he said. "After a year there I'll be a commissioned officer in the British Royal Navy, God bless His Majesty the King." He shrugged and grinned. "And before you tell me that naval officers are rarely respectable, Ave, let me remind you that any naval officer with the name Wentworth has always been both distinguished and respectable."

"I know that," Ava said, still looking odd. "I just didn't think you did. You've never seemed to care about family honour."

"Only because I knew I would have to care about it before long."

It seemed to Gwen that Ava suddenly stood a little straighter, carried herself a little jauntier, freed all at once from her worries over her brother's frivolous attitude toward life.

"And what will you do this autumn, Ave?" Gwen asked.

"Prepare for Oxford," she said. "I'll be attending Shrewsbury College next year. And what of you, have you decided whether you will go on to university, or settle down and be domesticated after high school?" Her words and expression were both challenging.

Hay laughed. "My dear Ave! Whatever Gwen does, she will never be any more domesticated than you are. I would as soon call a tiger in a cage at a zoo domesticated as either of you. The tiger might no longer be as free as he was in the wild, but he is still not safe."

"Were we just insulted or praised?" Gwen queried of Ava.

Ava rolled her eyes. "Just ignore him. You know what I mean."

Gwen sighed hugely, feeling both nervous and excited to announce it publicly. "I'm going to college."

"Brava!" Hay applauded.

Ava nodded. "Good. You've too fine a mind to waste." Her eyes lit up. "You should apply to Oxford! We could both go to Shrewsbury, together!"

Gwen had to laugh. "Oh Ava, I could never get in to Oxford!"

"There are scholarships, aren't there, for students from Canada and other dominions?"

"It's not the scholarship, Ave," Gwen told her, before honesty compelled her to add, "Well, not _just_ that. I haven't the brains for Oxford. And before you say 'nonsense,' I also could never go that far away from my family. It wouldn't be fair to them."

"A true Canadian," Hay declaimed. "She will not leave her native land, not even for her friends or a superior education."

"The colleges here are perfectly fine!" Gwen said with some indignation.

"Yes, but they are not Oxford," Hay said gravely, the dimples in his cheeks the only indication of his teasing.

"Perhaps not," Gwen conceded. "But still, my education will be perfectly adequate to my needs, right here in Canada."

Ava relinquished her dream with a sigh. "But we are still going to explore the world when we have both finished our education and are no longer needed at home," she warned.

"I wouldn't have it any other way."

"What's this?" Hay said. "Nobody is allowed to explore the world without me."

"Oh, Hay!" Gwen laughed. "You'll be exploring the world with the British Navy."

"True." They were at the shore by this point, and Hay stared solemnly out across the waters. "It's a vast world to explore, my lassies. Sometimes I don't know but what I'd rather take Uncle Edward's route and sequester myself away in a small village somewhere, living my life in peaceful obscurity."

"And miss all that chance for adventure? Nonsense!" Ave scoffed.

Hay's odd mood floated away with the sea breeze, and he grinned again. "I suppose not. Now, what's in those baskets? All this serious conversation has whetted my appetite!"

* * *

After lunching expansively on sandwiches, cookies, crackers and olives, fizzy lemonade and one of Lynde's matchless chocolate cakes Gwen had wheedled from Ingleside's housekeeper, the trio had to rest their bloated stomachs.

"I shall miss the food when I join the Navy," Hay said mournfully.

"I would be fat as a roly-poly kitten if I stayed here much longer," Ave said. "How do you stay so slim, Gwen?"

"You should meet my mother," Gwen said wistfully. "Four children, and she's still as slender as a birch tree."

After their food had digested, they swam and splashed in the waves for a bit, then gave themselves up to utter childishness and built sandcastles above the tideline. Both Hay and Ave were impressed with Gwen's abilities when it came to creating a massive and sturdy castle of sand.

"I've visited these shores every summer for most of my life," Gwen explained, draping some weed across the top of one turret. "Even if it's only for a week or two, that's a lot of years to practice." She stood back and stared at her creation in dissatisfaction. "If Jo were here, he could make it more beautiful. And Phil would know just what to do to dig a moat and have a fountain in the middle, without undermining the foundations."

"Sounds like quite a process, building a good sandcastle," said Hay. His face was flushed with sun and exertion as he scooped away at his moat with both hands.

"All us cousins join into a few different teams and have competitions every year," Gwen explained. A little frown line appeared between her brows. "Or at least, we used to, back when we were all kids. We haven't done it for a couple of years. Anyway, we usually ended up separating according to family - Phil, Jo, and I on one team; Lee would join with Rosie and Gil for another; Chloe, Isaac, and Isaiah on one, of course; and Jack, Leigh, and Owen rounding out the group."

"Who usually won?" Ave asked. Her smooth dark hair was tumbled by the wind, and in her wide-legged beach trousers and new carefree air, she looked more like Katharine Hepburn than ever.

"Oh, usually Jack's team. Our castles were always good, but if I didn't trip and fall into it at the crucial moment, one of the twins would always sabotage it. In fact, their team hardly ever had a decent castle, because Chloe would stand back and direct one of the twins to build, while the other one snuck around and tried to ruin everyone else's. Lee and Rosie and Gil always got caught out by them, too, but somehow they never got past Jack."

"Such a charming trio of siblings," Ave commented to the air.

"Oh, the boys aren't so bad," Gwen protested. "They just let Chloe tell them what to do too much. Or they used to. Now that Isaiah's stopped listening to her, Isaac doesn't do so much either, and so her claws are mostly pulled."

"Mostly," Hay said.

Gwen shrugged one shoulder and grinned. "She's _Chloe_. She'll never be completely harmless."

Ava stopped digging and stood upright, one hand pressed to the small of her back. "Well, I'm done with mine."

"I think mine's as good as it's going to get, too," Hay said.

Gwen stood back and joined them. The three stared at the trio of castles in the sand. Gwen's was tall and sturdy, with several towers and turrets and a proper moat, decorated with shells and seaweed.

Hay's was one tall tower, tilting dangerously near the top. He had put most of his effort into his moat, which was wide and deep, and populated with strange-looking creatures made of twigs, pebbles, and shells.

Ava's was wildly unconventional—it sprawled all over the place, with tunnels and bridges connecting the various parts. As elaborate as it looked, it was not particularly well-constructed, and parts of it were already starting to sag.

They all burst into laughter.

"We are, most certainly, three very different personalities," Ave said.

Hay reached out with his foot and nudged the top of his tower just a little bit more. The entire edifice came crashing down, landing in the moat and sending bits of damp sand and grit splattering everywhere. "The world would be a boring place if we all were alike. Come on girls, there's enough time for one more swim, and then back to Uncle Edward's for tea. I don't know about you dainty things, but I'm ravenous."

As she dove back into the waves, Gwen couldn't help but be grateful for these two friends she had made this summer. Her world, she knew, would be smaller and much more boring were it not for them.

* * *

**_Author's Note:_** Shrewsbury College at Oxford, does not, in fact, exist. I borrowed it from the incomparable Dorothy L Sayers, rather than attempt to use a real college (and risk getting the details wrong) or make one up on my own (and risk getting details wrong). Consider it my nod to that other beautifully strong-minded and independent woman of fiction, Harriet Vane! I'm sure she and Ava would have been grand friends.


	17. Chapter 17

Gwen and Isaiah had their long, lovely, lonely ramble through fields and shore the day after Gwen's picnic with the Wentworths. As usual, they didn't talk much. Gwen was enjoying the silent companionship between the two of them, and Isaiah, judging by his scowl, was dreading the return to school.

"It wasn't so bad before," he had told Gwen earlier. "When I could just ignore most of what the teachers said, and I didn't care about my grades. Now I'm going to have to work, and listen, and work some more." He sighed hugely.

"But it will be worth it, won't it?" Gwen asked slyly. "To be able to have your dream at the end?"

"My own horse, and the possibility of a job working with horses? You bet!" Isaiah said, his dark eyes kindling. "Not to mention getting away from home."

"Why Isaiah, what a terrible thing to say," Gwen said. Her tone was mild, though, because she was quite certain that if she lived with Aunt Rilla and Chloe, she would want to leave as well.

"You wouldn't think so if you lived there," Isaiah said, echoing her thoughts. He kicked a stone in the path. "Mum's sweet, of course, and Dad's swell, but … I don't feel like I know them, or they know anything about me. They raised us all by the book, and they think that we're going to follow a pattern, and if one of us doesn't, they either don't notice or blame it on outside influences."

"Like me being a bad influence on you," Gwen said, not quite hiding a grin.

Isaiah caught her humour and couldn't keep a reluctant smile off his own face. "Mum would like you better if Chloe weren't always telling her how nasty you are," he said frankly. He kicked at another stone and missed, sending up a huge cloud of dust to cover both of them. When they finished coughing, he continued. "I know I shouldn't complain—they give us everything we ask for, and they don't interfere in our lives unless it disrupts theirs, and even a few years ago I didn't care at all. But lately … I don't know, I just wish they were the sort of parents a fellow could be chums with as he gets older, you know? Like you and Phil and your parents, or Jack with Aunt Faith and Uncle Jem—even though they don't want him to be with Lynde, they aren't just forbidding him to see her, they're actually trying to work with him for something different—or even Owen and Leigh with Uncle Shirley and Aunt Persis."

Gwen's heart ached for her cousin, but what could she say? She slipped her hand through his arm and squeezed it, and that seemed sufficient.

"At least Mum will be pleased when I start bringing home better grades," he said. He rolled his eyes. "Although Chloe will probably somehow end up taking all the credit!"

Gwen couldn't hold back a merry laugh at that, and even Isaiah grinned. The rest of their walk proceeded in amicable silence, each of them content with their own thoughts. Gwen never got over being amazed at the friendship that had sprung up between them—two cousins who were so very, very different in every way.

* * *

After their walk, Gwen reluctantly went back to the Fords' summer house with Isaiah. She knew that the polite thing to do would be to bid farewell to Aunt Rilla and Uncle Ken, and wish them a pleasant winter. She didn't want to, but if she didn't it would reflect poorly on her upbringing, and she didn't want to give Aunt Rilla any opportunities to criticize her mother.

To her surprise, however, this prettiest of all her aunts drew her outside after making her goodbyes, and stood fiddling with the corner of her blouse.

"I think I may have done you an injustice, dear," she said finally.

Gwen blinked, wondering if her ears were still working properly. It almost sounded like Aunt Rilla was _apologizing_.

"You see, Chloe must have not heard all the story. She didn't tell me that dear little Bruce—oh dear, I _must_ stop calling him that—had been part of your 'deal' with Isaiah. Bruce talked to me about it the other evening, and while I still think you both _must_ have been mistaken in thinking that Isaiah would ever quit school, I see now that you really were trying to help."

"I would never do anything to hurt Isaiah, Auntie," Gwen said earnestly.

Aunt Rilla gave her a genuine smile. "I know that, I think. It's just hard for me always to be objective about my children. You are too young to understand this now, but someday, maybe, you will be married and have children of your own, and you'll remember this. You see, I had to watch all my brothers and friends leave when I was a young girl … and some of them didn't come back. The thought of my children leaving me when they are older … especially all the way across the world … and maybe never coming back, either, just terrifies me."

Gwen _did_ understand some of that, and she felt a pang of sympathy for her aunt, as well as sorrow that already Isaiah was dreaming about when he could leave. Holding too tightly, she surmised with a wisdom beyond her years, only resulted in making whomever you were holding wriggle all the more fiercely to escape.

"I really am sorry," she said again, her voice unconsciously gentle. She searched around in her mind for something comforting to say. "It's a long time between now and when Isaiah will graduate. Maybe, now that he's focusing more on his studies, he'll find something he likes better than horses, and he'll decide to stay close to home, instead. Maybe he'll even decide to go to college after all." She didn't think that was likely, but it was the best she could do.

Aunt Rilla patted her cheek. "You are rather a dear sometimes, Gwen." She stood back and surveyed her niece critically. "And your looks have improved greatly this summer. You're like me—I was all arms and legs when I was a girl, too, but eventually I grew into my limbs. I think you're going to be quite a handsome woman in a few years."

Gwen really didn't care whether she was going to be handsome or not, but she recognized this as her aunt's gesture of reconciliation, and responded accordingly. "I know I'll never be as pretty as you or Chloe, but it is nice to think that eventually I won't trip over my own feet every time I walk anywhere!"

Aunt Rilla laughed, and the two parted on surprisingly good terms.

* * *

Gwen popped into the House of Dreams on her way back to West House, bid Uncle Shirley and the kids goodbye and asked them to pass her love along to Aunt Persis, and then went along her way dreamily, thinking of all the exciting things that were going to happen before she came back to the Island again.

So she was not best pleased when her dreams were scattered by Oliver Grant, breathless and looking very pleased with himself as he caught up to her.

"Hello, Gwen," he said.

"Where did you come from?" Gwen asked.

He grinned. "I was visiting with the Fords when you and Isaiah came by—I was out back with Isaac and Chloe, so you didn't see me—and I decided to come see if I could catch up with you." His smile dimmed. "I haven't seen anything of you this summer. You've been all taken up with those Wentworths."

"Ava and Hayden are not 'those Wentworths,' nor have I been 'all taken up' with them," Gwen said with asperity. "In case you've forgotten, I came out this summer to help Aunt Ruth, and that's what I did. I only saw Ave and Hay, along with Lynde and my cousins, in my spare time."

"Maybe," Oliver said. "It just seemed like every time I wanted to spend time with you, you were off with them. Especially Hayden." It looked for a moment like he was going to reach for Gwen's hand, but to her relief he refrained.

"Well," Gwen said, trying to be charitable. "Are you looking forward to school starting again? You must be glad that Jack will be back soon."

Oliver shrugged. "I suppose. Though Jack's all taken up with Lynde these days. Makes a fellow lonely, you know? Makes him wish he had a girl of his own, even if she lived far away."

"That's a silly reason for wanting to be with someone," Gwen said, her hands rubbing her sides uneasily. Oliver wasn't going to start with his nonsense _again_, was he?

He opened his mouth, but Gwen rushed over him with her words, determined to not give him a chance to speak. "Well, I am looking forward to going back home. Not only do I miss everyone back there dreadfully, I am excited for my last year of high school."

"What are your plans after next year, then?" Oliver asked, momentarily distracted.

"College," Gwen said triumphantly. It just got easier and easier each time she said it.

"That's good," Oliver said, nodding.

"It is?" Gwen had been certain Oliver would disapprove—he didn't seem to like anything she did that didn't involve him in the decision-making process.

"Everyone should have a complete education," he said. "Mother says so, and I agree. Even if you just want to teach to save up money for when you get married, it's a good thing for everyone."

"Well, I don't want to teach, and I have no interest in getting married."

"You'll change your mind eventually!" Oliver laughed. He gave her a sidelong glance. "About the marrying thing, I mean. Not the teaching. I don't see you enjoying teaching."

"I don't see me enjoying marriage, either," Gwen said. Her ears picked up the call of the geese flying south, and she wished she were as free as them to fly away from this boy who would not leave her alone. "Especially not to someone who won't ever let me be myself."

"That Wentworth fellow would certainly expect to run your life, if you married him," Oliver said, nodding his head as though the two were in perfect agreement.

Gwen's slow anger kindled, but before she could burst out at him, he kept speaking, oblivious to his danger.

"The other reason I'm glad you're going to college is that I'll be at Redmond too, next year, and we can help each other study, like we did when we were both part of the Owls."

"I'm not going to Redmond," Gwen told him with great satisfaction.

Oliver's jaw dropped. "But all the Blythes go to Redmond!"

"As Chloe takes delight in reminding me all the time, I'm a Blake, not a Blythe. And we go to college wherever we wish."

"Don't you want to go to Redmond, though?"

"Not in the least," Gwen said. She spied a familiar figure opening the gate to West House up ahead. "Excuse me, Oliver, I really must run and catch Tryg. I haven't had a chance to tell him goodbye yet."

Oliver watched her dart away, thinking bitterly that she hadn't bothered to tell _him_ goodbye.

At least it was only Trygve, and not the Wentworth chap. That just would have been too much entirely.

* * *

Tryg's face lighted in his slow smile as he saw Gwen approaching at her steady lope. Even in a skirt and blouse, her form was flawless; her running coaches would have been proud.

"I was just about to knock and see if you were in," he said.

Gwen came to a stop and caught her breath. "I am now."

He waved an envelope before her face. "This is from the last magazine. And—it's thin!"

Gwen gasped, and it wasn't from exertion. "Grandmother says thin envelopes are always good news."

Tryg nodded. "That's why I waited to open it. If they did accept our story, I wanted us to find out together."

Gwen glanced back down the road. Oliver was still standing there, watching them. She turned back to Tryg.

"Let's go over to Ingleside. I know Grandmother will want to watch us as we open it, too."

Tryg wrinkled his nose. "I've waited this long, I guess I can wait a few more minutes."

Gwen seized his hand. "Let's take the shortcut through the woods." Hand in hand, they darted off, leaving a very frustrated Oliver staring forlornly at the empty garden.

As always, once Oliver was out of sight, Gwen forgot about him entirely. Her heart was beating faster with anticipation. Would that small envelope really contain an acceptance? Were she and Tryg going to be published? Was their fun project going to be the start of a long and successful partnership? At that dizzying moment, anything seemed possible.

Grandmother was in the garden, snipping dead heads off her flowers, when Gwen and Tryg rushed. It was but the work of a few moments and a couple jumbled words before she understood why they were there.

"Oh, open it, open it!" she cried, dropping shears, basket, and withered flowers in a careless heap and clasping her hands together girlishly.

So Tryg tore it open, and with Gwen peering over one shoulder and Grandmother over the other, read the first line aloud:

"Dear Mr. Ahlberg and Ms. Blake, we are pleased to inform you that we have found your short story _A Fishy Tale_ acceptable for publication in our next edition …" There Tryg had to stop, for both Grandmother and Gwen shrieked in his ears.

"Ow!" he complained, dropping the letter to clap his hands over his ears.

"Sorry," Gwen said, beaming from ear to ear. "It's just … oh, isn't it marvellous?"

"It certainly is!" Grandmother exclaimed. "I'm so proud of you children I could just burst!"

Tryg cast caution to the wind for once and grabbed Gwen around the waist. He spun her in a circle, and then they waltzed around and around the garden, with Grandmother's laughing eyes following them.

"Goodness sakes," Lynde said, coming out onto the verandah. "Whatever is going on?"

With the addition of another person, Tryg remembered himself and dropped his hands at once. Gwen, however, ran up to Lynde and seized her in an exuberant hug. "Oh Lynde, darling! Tryg and I aren't ourselves at all. We've just had our story published, in a real magazine—or at least, it's going to be published—and we are just a little crazy with joy!"

Lynde hugged her back. "Well, I can understand that, but can't you be crazy someplace that's not visible from the road? What is Mrs. Douglas had driven by and seen you?"

"Yes, come inside so we can tell your Grandfather," Grandmother said, looping her arm through Tryg's. "And then you two must stay for supper. Lynde, have we enough?"

Lynde looked faintly disgusted at the imputed slur on the readiness of her kitchen to accommodate two more guests. "Of course, Mrs. Dr. Blythe. And I'll whip up a chocolate cake to celebrate, as well. And should we invite Dr. Bruce and Mrs. Ruth, as well?"

"Oh yes," Anne said. "I'll 'phone Ruth as soon as we've told Gilbert the grand news. Oh! Another published author in the family. This marks the third generation of writers in the family, how wonderful. And Tryg, your illustrations are just splendid—none of us can draw at all, I'm so glad you shared your talents with Gwen. The two of you make just a marvellous team."

Tryg and Gwen exchanged a happy grin. "I think you're right, Grandmother," Gwen said.

As they stormed into Grandfather's study, Grandmother has a sudden thought.

She hoped Gwen _wasn't_, in fact, serious about the Wentworth lad. He was nice enough, but not for darling Gwennie. _Trygve_, on the other hand, suited her just perfectly.

Her eyes got that matchmaking gleam, but she sternly told herself not to meddle. She had sworn off matchmaking years ago, and she never broke a vow.

But oh, it would be a shame if these two never saw what was right in front of them!

Well. She would give them a few years to figure it out. If they didn't … surely it wasn't matchmaking to simply nudge two people in the right direction? Especially when those two people were so perfectly matched?

She would be perfectly justified, she decided.

A partnership like this deserved to be permanent, and something more than just business!


	18. Chapter 18

Gwen's bags were packed and in the car. She had made her rounds to say goodbye to all her friends and family in the Glen. She had had a special, late-night conversation with Grandmother and Grandfather Blythe, where she revealed many of her dreams and goals for the future, and they had encouraged her and promised to do whatever they could to help her achieve those goals. She had stopped by "Uncle Edward's" _café_ for one last cup of tea with Ave and Hay, exchanging addresses and promises to write.

In short, Gwen was completely ready to leave. Now her only problem was getting out the door.

She looked down at the two small girls wound around her legs, effectively pinning her in place.

"But Winnie, Ruthie," she said. "I have to go home. I miss my family, and school is starting soon."

"But we'll miss you," Ruthie sobbed, burying her face in Gwen's knee.

"Don't you love us?" Winnie's lower lip trembled artistically as she squeezed a few tears out of her eyes.

"Girls, girls!" Aunt Ruth was burdened by a fussy Nona, and could only stand by and plead with her daughters to behave. "Let go of Gwen this instant! She'll miss her train!"

"Good!" Winnie said. "Then she'll have to stay forever."

Uncle Bruce came in from starting the car and took the scene in with one swift glance. He started to chuckle, but a stern look from his wife quelled the impulse. He cleared his throat.

"Ahem! Rosemary Ruth and Ellen Winifred, if you do not release your cousin at once, it'll be …" he hesitated.

"Bed with no supper," Aunt Ruth said crisply.

"And no treats for a week," he added.

"And extra chores every day."

"And no more trips to the shore for swimming!"

It was that last threat that finally made them let go of her legs. Gwen staggered as they flung themselves away.

"Oh, for heaven's sake," she said. She knelt down and opened her arms. "Come give me a a hug, at least."

They rushed at her and threw their arms around her neck, squeezing until she couldn't breathe.

"I will miss you two dreadfully," she whispered. "You take care of yourselves and your baby sister while I'm gone!"

"We will," Ruthie promised, while Winnie gave Gwen a dazzling smile.

Gwen stood up and gave Aunt Ruth a hug next, kissing Nona's fuzzy soft head.

"Thank you for everything, Gwen," Aunt Ruth said, sniffling a little herself. "We couldn't have made it without you."

"It's been one of the best summers of my life," Gwen said with perfect truth. "I'm ever so glad Uncle Bruce put you on bed rest so I could come!"

"We really do have to go, Gwen," Uncle Bruce said, so with one last lingering look and a final wave, Gwen left West House behind. She blinked back a stray tear, and mustering up her most determined smile, turned to her uncle.

"May I drive?"

He roared with laughter. "Be my guest," he said with a low bow. Gwen sprang into the driver's seat and fixed her hat more firmly on her curls.

"Hold tight," she said, and roared off.

Despite their late start, they made it to the train station in plenty of time. Uncle Bruce wiped his face. "I am never letting Winnie drive anything more than a tame old donkey," he muttered, clamping his hat back on his head.

"I wasn't that bad!" Gwen protested. "I didn't hit anything."

"Only because that old man dove into the hedge!"

Gwen giggled. "It was a spectacular dive, wasn't it?"

Uncle Bruce tried to look stern, but the mental picture proved too much for him, and he began to laugh, too. "Head over heels, perfect form!"

Gwen slid down the side of the car, clutching her stomach. "Lucky … the grass … is so tall and soft in August … to break his landing," she wheezed.

"Didn't you hear that yowl? I'm certain he landed on a cat! He'll probably be in my office tomorrow morning, with two broken bones and scratches all over his face." Uncle Bruce was doubled over with laughter by now. Everyone at the station was looking curiously at them, but they didn't even notice.

"Promise you won't tell Dad?" Gwen asked, finally standing up straight and wiping her streaming eyes. "He'll never let me behind the wheel of another car if he hears about this."

"As long as you don't go around telling people that I let you be the wheeled menace of PEI this summer."

"Deal."

Uncle Bruce stopped laughing and swept her into a bear hug. "Ah Gwen, we're going to miss you so! Why don't you give up school and marry Oliver Grant so you can stay here forever?"

"Uncle Bruce!" Gwen looked around to make sure nobody had heard. Unfortunately, at least half a dozen people were standing within earshot—one of them Mary Douglas! Gwen groaned to herself. More rumours! "I have plans, I'll have you know, and they don't involve marriage."

"These uppity modern women," Uncle Bruce said. "She gets one story published and thinks she can run the world."

Gwen stuck her tongue out at him. "It won't stop at one story. You'll see. Tryg and I are going to be _famous_."

The train whistle drowned out any reply Uncle Bruce was going to make. The next few minutes were all bustle and hurry as they got her bags aboard and her ticket situated.

"All joking aside, Gwen, we can never thank you enough for everything you did this summer. We will always be grateful."

Gwen kissed her uncle's cheek. "It was good for me, too. I learned a lot this summer—about myself, and about life. And that I never want to have a baby."

Uncle Bruce's smile broke through his gravity again, and as he boosted her onto the train, Gwen's last glimpse of him was a pleasant one. She found a seat by a window and pushed it open, waving frantically. He waved back.

"Safe journey! Our love to Di and Jon and the rest of them!"

"I will tell them! Goodbye, Uncle Bruce!"

As the train pulled away, Gwen saw two figure approach at a run, one from either end of the station. One was unmistakably Oliver Grant—thank goodness he hadn't been there a few minutes earlier to hear Uncle Bruce!—while the other, now near enough for Gwen to see clearly, was Tryg.

She leaned out and waved at him. "Tryg! Over here!"

He picked up his speed. "Gwen! I've had an idea for a new story!"

"Send it to me in a letter!" Gwen called.

He nodded, and the train picked up speed. "Goodbye!" he shouted. "Thank you for everything this summer!"

Gwen was too far away for anything but a scream, so she settled for waving as hard as she could. She settled back in her seat, completely missing the sight of Oliver's disappointed face behind the enormous bouquet of roses whose purchase had delayed his arrival at the station.

Gwen was spared that, though. She smiled to herself as she wondered what Tryg's idea was. It was bound to be good. Fancy him coming all the way to the station just to tell her about it! He was a good partner, and a dear friend. She was going to miss him.

She would miss all her Island friends, but oh! She was going _home_. Gwen's heartbeat picked up a little as she thought about her family, and how much she wanted to see them.

"I have so much to tell them all," she murmured to herself.

* * *

The ferry ride was uneventful. Gwen made friends with a pair of elderly spinsters who were from the States.

"We've been friends ever since we were young girls," explained Miss Ivy. She had a strong-featured face and a commanding air, despite her seventy years. "We've shared a little cottage in the middle of Ohio for years now, and we decided this year it was finally time to fulfill our promise to ourselves and visit all the places we've always dreamed of seeing."

Miss Kate was shorter than Miss Ivy, with a rounder face and twinkling eyes. She wasn't as forceful as her friend, but Gwen noticed that people hopped to do her bidding just as quickly as they did Miss Ivy. "So first we toured around our own country for a year, and when we'd visited every place we wanted to see, we decided to branch out into other countries as well. Canada was first on our list—and of course we've always wanted to see Prince Edward Island—and next we'll be going to Mexico!"

"Isn't that dangerous?" Gwen asked doubtfully, visions of bandits and rockslides, borrowed from Jo's adventure stories, sneaking through her brain.

"Not in the least," Miss Ivy said.

Miss Kate winked. "_Movie stars_ like to stay at various resorts in Mexico. If we're lucky, we might even get to see some of them!"

"Kate and I have a weakness for movie stars," Miss Ivy confessed, as if admitting to a fondness for robbing people of their life savings.

"Do you want us to get you any autographs?" Miss Kate asked.

Gwen laughed. "That's very kind of you, but I'm afraid I wouldn't even know who to ask! I like to go to the cinema, but I don't really follow the stars that much."

"Very sensible," Miss Ivy said.

Miss Kate's faded blue eyes widened. "Ooh Ivy, doesn't Gwen strike you as a young Carole Lombard?"

Even Gwen knew who _that_ was, and she didn't think she fit that glamorous description at all. But Miss Ivy was nodding.

"Indeed she does! I was trying to place her."

"That lovely sweet face, and the beautiful golden hair …"

"Even her clothes, wouldn't you say? The same air of simplicity to them, that same streamlined look."

"Gwen, dear, you should really get a fur fedora to wear, and then the resemblance would be perfect."

"I'll keep that in mind," Gwen said, before making her escape.

For the rest of the trip, the two ladies called her "Carole," and Miss Kate promised that they would try to get the real Carole's autograph if they saw her in Acapulco, and they would send it to Gwen.

All in all, though Gwen found the two charming and amusing, she was glad enough to step off the ferry and see a familiar figure awaiting her past the docks.

"Dad!" she cried, rushing forward into her father's waiting arms.

"Gwen!" he replied, picking her up and spinning her around as though she were a child again. "By the great god Ra, it's good to see you!"

Gwen got her feet back under her and straightened her un-glamorous hat. "Dad, have you been reading Egyptian mythology again? You know the parishioners don't like it when you talk about the ancient gods and goddesses."

Jon grinned unrepentantly. "You see what happens when you're not here to keep me straight? Now, I want to hear all about the Glen folk, and I'm sure you have photographs of Baby Nona you are dying to show me, but I've promised Mother, Lee, and Jo that I won't let you tell me anything until we're all home and you can tell us all at once. So let's get your bags and fly home."

Gwen's happy sigh came all the way from her toes. "_Home_. It sounds wonderful." She patted her coat pocket, wherein lay not just photographs of Nona, but that wonderful acceptance letter for her and Tryg's story. She had, by some miracle, managed to keep it a secret from everyone, just so she could tell them all at once.

"Jeremy's at the house, too, and your grandmother," Jon said. "Your grandmother wants to know all about your young men." He winked at her.

"Thank goodness, I have come home fancy free," Gwen said emphatically.

"Well, Grandmother took that as matter of course. What she really wants to know is how many hearts you broke."

This time, it was a groan that traveled from Gwen's toes and burst out her mouth. "As if it weren't bad enough having to listen to Uncle Bruce calling me a heart-breaker all summer, now Grandmother? It isn't fair, Dad, really it's not."

Jon laughed and patted her arm sympathetically. "Your uncle loves to tease, my dear, and as for your grandmother, in you and Lee and your cousins she sees her lost youth—especially in you. Lee, you know, is so much like your mother's mother, and both of Jeremiah's girls take more after _their_ mother."

"But Dad, I'm nothing like as pretty or popular as Grandmother was when she was a girl."

"Your fair hair and blue eyes might come from my father, darling girl, but if you don't think you look strikingly like your grandmother used to, you haven't been looking in the mirror properly. The difference is, my mother was aware of her looks and played on them, while you ignore them. And that _does_ make all the difference, and it's something I'm proud of in you, my Gwen."

They passed by Miss Ivy and Miss Kate while Gwen was digesting this. Both ladies waved.

"Goodbye, Carole, dear!"

"We'll send you a postcard from Acapulco, even if we don't get your autograph!"

Jon slanted a glance at his daughter. "Gwen, do you mind telling me why those two old ladies called you Carole? Are you operating under a secret identity these days?"

Gwen laughed and explained, but she was still thinking furiously.

Dad thought she was beautiful, but all fathers thought that about their children. Dad wasn't the fatuous, adoring type, though, and he would never call her pretty if he didn't truly think it.

Oliver had carried a torch for her for two years, without any encouragement from her, and even through her active _dis_couragement.

Chloe acted as though she was jealous of Gwen, like Gwen was a threat to her, even though Chloe was the acknowledged beauty of the clan.

And finally, Hayden Wentworth had obviously found her attractive enough to spend the entire summer flirting with her, even to the point of trying to kiss her.

She still didn't think she was a Carole Lombard, but maybe it was time she stopped telling herself she didn't have anything about her to appeal to anyone, and started believing that she had, possibly, inherited some of her grandmother's beauty and charm.

Not that she would suddenly start becoming a flirt, but …

Gwen half-smiled to herself. It _would_ be very nice to be able to see the mirror as a friend and not a foe.

But all that later, when she could talk to Mother in private. Right now, she was going to simply rejoice in being back with her family, who would love her whether she was the most beautiful woman alive or the ugliest.


	19. Chapter 19

The reunion was everything Gwen had imagined. Hugs, kisses, exclamations, exchanging stories in a jumbled mess, knowing there was plenty of time to sort it all out later, Grandmother's gurgling giggle ringing out just as clearly as Lee's silver laugh. The only thing that would have made it better would have been if Phil had been there too, but he wasn't due for another few days.

In some ways, Gwen rather liked being the first to come home. This way she would be able to be a part of Phil's homecoming celebration, maybe even bake him his favourite gold-and-silver cake from Susan Baker's old recipe, the cake that Mother had never been able to master and Gwen had conquered under Lynde's tutoring.

Mother and Lee cooed over the photographs of Nona, while Jo dashed right to the piano to try out the new music Uncle Bruce had sent for him. Grandmother was arguing with Dad over the role the god Ra truly played in Egyptian mythology, and Jeremy and Gwen had a moment to catch their breath.

"It's good to have you back, even if I do have to leave in a couple weeks myself." Jeremy leaned against the wall and smiled ruefully.

Gwen watched him admiringly. He had obviously spent most of the summer out-of-doors at Mount Holly. His fair hair was bleached even lighter by the sun, and his teeth flashed whitely in his tanned face when he grinned. Hayden Wentworth might have been a handsome chap, but he really couldn't hold a candle to Jeremy. Even Ava would have to admire him!

"Off to Toronto, to conquer university and the big city," she sighed. "It will be so odd to have you gone this year."

"Not to worry," he said cheerfully. "You'll be off to college next year, and then things will really be different. You should come to the University too, Gwen. Think of all the fun we could have."

Gwen shook her head. "I'll be staying closer to home. _Not_ Redmond, mind, but someplace where, even if I can't live at home, I can still come home on the weekends and help Mother out around the house, listen to Dad preach, that sort of thing."

"That's my Gwen, always thinking of others." Jeremy shrugged one shoulder. "Oh well. It was a nice idea."

"You could always stay closer to home," Gwen suggested, a mischievous twinkle in her eyes. She propped herself up against the wall next to him.

Jeremy snorted. "Dad would have ten thousand fits if I gave up Toronto for some second-rate college here. Don't get me wrong, I don't think they're second-rate, but you know how Father is. Besides," he winked, "I'm looking forward to getting out from under his thumb. You know?"

Gwen did, indeed. If her dad was like Uncle Jeremiah, she would be considering the furthest possible school.

"I have something to tell you—well, show you, really," she said, changing the subject.

Jeremiah's eyebrows went up. "Not a ring from Hayden Wentworth! Please, Gwen, my heart couldn't take it. Not tonight."

Gwen lightly knocked his arm. "_No_, you idiot. What a notion! No, it's something I did this summer—well, I and a friend—and I wanted you to see it before I showed everyone else." She drew the acceptance letter and the edition of the magazine that had printed the story out from behind her back and handed them to her cousin.

He took them curiously, scanning the letter first, then giving her a look of incredulous pride, and instantly rifling through the magazine until he found the story. Then he let out a whoop loud enough that it even stopped Jo at the piano.

"Gwen, this is wonderful!"

"What is?" Grandmother demanded at once.

Jeremy waved the magazine in the air. "Our Gwen's gone and gotten herself published without telling any of us!"

"What?" exclaimed Mother, jumping up and letting the photographs of Nona scatter to the floor. Dad rushed over as well, snatching the magazine from Jeremy's hand.

"Where?"

Jo came in from the music room, and Lee abandoned her attempt to pick up the pictures, and everyone crowded around, asking questions and stammering out how proud they were. Gwen couldn't keep the grin off her face.

It was glorious.

* * *

"Gwen, could you hand me the egg beater, darling?"

Gwen picked up the red-handled utensil and passed it to her mother. Before returning to her cake, she paused and brushed a stray lock of hair out of her face, only realizing after that she had probably left a white streak across her forehead.

Di smiled fondly at her daughter. "It's lovely to have my girl back home, and working with me in the kitchen."

Gwen grinned back as she sifted the flour and baking powder together. "And you don't even have to worry about me burning the house down."

"You've been a good cook ever since your year on the Island, with Lynde as your tutor." Di grimaced. "I'm afraid I was never a very good teacher, even when it was my main occupation! I'm not sure who was more relieved when I went off to college, the students, the school board (who didn't want to offend my parents by sacking me), or me."

Gwen giggled. She couldn't imagine any student not adoring her merry, fun-loving mother, even if she hadn't been the most effective teacher.

"Speaking of college …" Di said, letting the unspoken question hang in the air.

"I've already started looking at brochures," Gwen confessed. "Is that silly?"

"Not at all! You only have a year left of school; now is the time to be deciding where you want to go. What are your top choices so far?"

A sudden thought struck Gwen. "You aren't bothered by the fact that I don't want to go to Redmond, are you?" She had been so emphatic on forging her own path that she hadn't considered until this very moment that it might hurt Mother and Dad that she didn't want to follow in their footsteps.

"Goodness, no! Your dad and I think it's wonderful that you children are making your own way. We never want you to do anything just because it's what we did." Di stopped turning the egg beater and stared absently at the golden goo dripping from the pedals. "Of course, I _hope_ none of you children decide to not do something just because we did it, either."

"What do you mean?"

"Even though I enjoyed writing as a girl, I told myself that I would never become a writer. Everyone expected me to be just like Mother, you see, because I looked so much like her. Never mind the fact that Nan was the one who was more like Mother! Just because I had red hair and green eyes, people told me all the time that I was 'so much like my mother,' and I hated it. I wanted to be my own person. So I swore I would never do anything that Mother had done, just to prove to the world that I wasn't her.

"Then, after Walter died, I started writing again, and somehow _not_ being like Mother didn't seem so important anymore. I stopped asking myself if doing this or that or the other thing was something Mother would do, and just started _living_." Di lowered the pedals back into the mix and started beating again.

"Nobody has ever told me I was just like you," Gwen said, trying to keep the wistfulness out of her voice. She almost wished she'd had the same problem as Mother! "Or like Dad. It's just … you and Dad, and all my grandparents and aunts and uncles … you have all done so much at Redmond, that people would assume I would do great things, too. And I know that I would be so terrified of putting a foot wrong that I would make blunder after blunder, and I would be so worried about damaging your reputation that I would do everything wrong!"

Di couldn't hold back a laugh. "My poor Gwen! So that's why you do so well at running, is it? Because nobody has any expectations of you?"

"Well, that did help at first."

"I want you to go to the school that can best help you achieve your dreams, my Gwen, be that Redmond or McGill, or even some fancy school in the States!"

"Oh no, I want to stay here," Gwen assured her. "Or at least close enough to come home on weekends."

"So what are your top choices?" Di's green eyes were bright with interest.

Gwen took her hands out of her batter long enough to wave them around enthusiastically as she spoke. "St. Adolphus is one."

"The women's college?" Di looked surprised. "Would you really want to go to a school for just women?"

Gwen shrugged. "My biggest concern, actually, is that it's Catholic, and I don't know if they would like having a Protestant minister's daughter attending. My other top pick is Mount Tamzin."

"That is an excellent school," Di said, nodding.

"And that's my worry there—that it's too good, and I won't be able to get in."

"Nonsense! You have a fine mind and a wonderful work ethic. There's no school you couldn't get into if you set your mind to it."

Gwen grinned and finally turned back to her cake batter. Parents were wonderful creatures, really.

"Mum," she asked a few minutes later, after the batter had been carefully poured into the pans and she and Di were sitting side-by-side on the old wooden table, companionably scraping bowls and licking spoons, "do you think I look like Grandmother Blake?"

Di turned her head and scrutinized her daughter for a long moment. "Yes," she said finally. "In many ways. You inherited most of your features from her: your crooked eyebrows; your pointed chin; your dear little funny smile. But only on the surface. Your personality is very different from hers, so in some ways, you don't look like her at all."

Gwen nodded and gave her spoon another lick. That made sense—why other people thought she looked like Grandmother, and why she could never see it.

"It's just … well, it's not that I care so much about being pretty, but … or maybe I do, because who doesn't want to be pretty, or handsome if you're a boy? But it's not terribly important, but it would be nice to think that I wasn't ugly, and then Hayden this summer, and Oliver … oh Mother, he acted like such an idiot all summer long … and then the ladies on the ferry said I looked like Carole Lombard, of all people! And I just, well, I just would like to know whether or not I really was."

Di's smile as she looked at her daughter was understanding. She remembered all too well what it was like to be seventeen and facing the world in all its uncertainties.

"I guess," Gwen said, staring at her distorted reflection in the back of the spoon, "I guess I am just trying to figure out who and what I am, really. Am I the Ugly Duckling of the family, like I always thought? Clumsy, not pretty, not good at anything, always saying and doing the wrong thing at the wrong time? Or am I more the way some people seem to be seeing me: attractive and competent; a good writer; a good runner; able to maintain a household and help birth a baby?"

"How other people see us and how we see ourselves will always differ," Di said. "Some people, like Chloe and Mary Douglas, and old Mrs. Winthrop at Dad's church, think of themselves better than everyone else does. Others, like you and me, think of ourselves worse. In the end, does it really matter? I think … I think the best thing, darling dear, is to think less about who we are, and more about who we _want_ to be. And in the end, looks play a very small role in that." She leaned over and winked. "But for the record, I have always thought you beautiful, even when you were at most clumsy, and now that you are growing into your own skin, I think you are more beautiful yet."

Gwen's smile at that moment was certainly very beautiful. "Thanks, Mums." She put her arm around her mother's shoulders and hugged her. "Now, what is next on our list for Phil's homecoming?"

"I think the next thing is to prepare the chicken for frying," Di said, beating Gwen to the last of the cake batter.

Gwen closed her eyes dreamily. "Mmm, fried chicken, biscuits, the last of the fresh garden produce for the season, and gold-and-silver cake for dessert. Isn't it lucky that Phil and I have the same taste in food? His favourites are my favourites, for almost everything!"

"So that's why you were so eager to make him a special homecoming meal," Di teased.

Gwen shrugged and hopped down from the table. "Any excuse to eat well, as Lynde would say!"

* * *

Gwen nearly fainted when Dad and Phil got back to the house from the train station. _Could_ this be her boy-brother, this tall, broad-shouldered, sun-tanned young man with the work-roughened hands and a new air of confidence draped over him like a cloak? When he grabbed her in a fierce hug, she could feel the strength in his grasp.

"Jinks, but it's good to see you all again!" he kept exclaiming. He sniffed. "Mother, is that fried chicken I smell? I don't think I've had a decent meal since I left—none of the workers on the expedition were what you would call great cooks, even if the supplies had been better."

"Fried chicken, and Gwen made a gold-and-silver cake for dessert," Mother said, wiping her eyes discreetly.

Phil whistled. "What a homecoming!"

Gwen trailed behind as they all moved into the dining room, trying to catch her breath. Somehow, even though she had changed so much this summer, she had expected Phil to be the same. Unreasonable, she realized now, but it was going to take her a little bit to get her feet back under her and swallow this ridiculous sensation of disappointment.

It didn't quite go away, though, until after they had finished eating (Phil's appetite, again, astounded them all) and were heading up to bed at a ridiculously late hour. Phil had told them all his stories, but he still seemed like a stranger to Gwen.

He caught up to her on the stairs. "Your room or mine?" he whispered.

Gwen grinned. Back in the day when their younger siblings slept like logs, the older two used to sneak into each other's bedroom to talk, once every week or so, just to get caught up on each other's life without worrying about being overheard.

"Neither," she whispered back. "Both Lee and Jo are too old—they might wake up. Let's try the attic, instead."

"I'll bring the candles," Phil said.

"I'll bring the snacks."

Unbeknownst to them, their parents smirked at each other on the steps below.

"Do you think we should tell them we know about their midnight meetings, and just offer them the music room?" Jon whispered to his wife.

Di shook her head, her eyes dancing with mirth. "And spoil their fun? Never!"


	20. Chapter 20

Phil stretched out his long legs with a sigh of satisfaction. "Now, this is something like." He bit into one of the apples Gwen had purloined from the kitchen. "It gave me an awful shock to see you this afternoon, Gwen," he said around the mouthful of fruit. "Lee and Jo haven't changed that much, but you …!"

Gwen split open a roll and layered some cheese between the pieces. "Me? What about you? My little brother has turned into a man!"

Phil puffed out his chest before settling into quiet laughter. "Uncle Carl expects everyone to pull his or her weight. Science is a lot more than just studying something in a laboratory, and I'm awful glad to have had this experience now."

"So you still want to be a scientist?"

"More than ever," and with his quiet fervour, Gwen felt like she had her brother back.

"And you," he said. "You want to make writing your career?"

"I think so," Gwen said. "At least, I want to pursue it for now, and if I find something I love more along the way, then that's fine too. But right now, I can see myself being perfectly happy to write for the rest of my life."

"Not run?"

Gwen took another bite of her roll and cheese. "I will always love running," she said after swallowing. "And it certainly came in handy this summer, when I had to go fetch Uncle Bruce for Nona's birth. But it's not … I mean, a professional athlete is such a different and difficult lifestyle, and no matter how dedicated one is, eventually one's body just won't perform the same way anymore. I can't see myself doing that for my entire life. I'll probably try to run in college, just like high school, but I'm not really interested in the Olympics or anything like that. It's not going to be my life, you know?"

Phil nodded, swallowed the last of his apple, and reached for the peanut butter cookies. "I don't suppose you liberated any cake?"

"Mother might overlook these things tomorrow, but she would surely notice if half the cake went missing."

"I suppose." Phil picked up the milk bottle. "You don't think she'll notice the milk missing?"

Gwen's grin was cheekily triumphant. "The milkman delivers tomorrow morning, plus I volunteered to make breakfast, so no, I don't think she'll notice."

"Clever and sly. What _did_ you do this summer?"

Gwen filled him in on her summer, all her thoughts and growth, everything except the almost-kiss from Hayden. That just wasn't something you mentioned to your brother, no matter how close the two of you were.

Phil, as was his way, listened without comment, neither judging nor excusing anything, just giving Gwen a chance to talk it out. Then he began to tell her more about his summer, the details he hadn't shared in the family conversation: Uncle Carl's unpredictable temper; how hard it was to train himself not to mind the dirt and discomfort on the expedition; how very uncertain he felt at times, given the overwhelming knowledge of everyone else; and finally, the growing attraction between him and Miss Emerson, the niece and protegee of Miss Ward, the distinguished ecologist.

"You see, Cora—that is, Miss Emerson—even though she's two years older than me, we were the only young people on the expedition, and she's used to people scorning her because she's training to become an botanist. Most people seem to think either that botany isn't a 'real' science, just something Victorian ladies used to do to while away their days—labelling plants and such—or else that any kind of science is improper for a young lady to pursue. Cora's parents don't even like her showing such an interest, because they're afraid it will damage her marriage prospects. Can you imagine? In this day and age!"

Gwen hid a smile at Phil's indignation.

"And of course, since my special area of interest is geology, we had a lot to talk about, because our two disciplines are so connected, and Gwen, she's so smart, smarter than I am, and she's been trained so much better, but she never made me feel stupid or inferior, and well …" Phil trailed off, a beatific expression on his face.

Gwen couldn't help but feel a little jealous of this brilliant Cora Emerson, sharing something with Phil that she never could. Then she reminded herself of her collaboration with Tryg. While there was no romantic aspect to their partnership, it was still something unique to them, something Phil couldn't experience.

They were, she supposed, growing up, and this was part of it—branching out into different lives and interests. Thank goodness they were still able to have times like this, where they could sneak away from everyone and share time together.

"What are you smiling about?" Phil said, coming out of his blissful daydream.

"Just imagining sometime far in the future, when we're both older and maybe have families of our own. Do you suppose, when we come back here for visits, that we'll still slip away at midnight for a heart-to-heart?"

"I hope so," Phil said. He stretched out full-length on the floor, his hands behind his head, gazing up at the wooden ceiling. "Things are changing, Gwennie—this is your last year of high school, and before long we'll both be away at college, and then moving on to careers. But I sure hope that no matter what else changes, we'll always have each other."

Gwen couldn't reply in words, but she laid down next to her brother and rested her head on his shoulder.

And that was how Di found them in the morning when, upon rising, she discovered both of their beds empty and a ravaged icebox. She stood at the top of the stairs, looking at their sleeping faces. They looked very young; Phil with his silvery-blond hair flopped endearingly over one eye as he snored quietly, and Gwen smiling in her sleep as though her dreams were very pleasant. Di tiptoed quietly back down the stairs and decided to make breakfast herself that morning.

Her children were only going to be children a little longer, and only in certain ways. Before long they would be out in the world, flying on their own, hers no longer. They were already starting to grow up and become independent, and each coming day would bring more of that independence.

For now, she would let them sleep. Let them be children while they still could. While they were still hers to cherish and hold, she would do what she could for them.

Even if that was as simple as just making breakfast.

**_The End_**


End file.
